Treaded Steps
by Molly-Chan the AnimeGame Fan
Summary: [AU, RS, RE Crossover with FMA] After the incident at Monstro, Sora finds himself in a strange new place, with only his right hand and no memories. [Better description inside]
1. I

Umm...Hello, this must seem like a silly idea for a KH fanfic, especially since it's a crossover, but I've been actually thinking about it for quite some time for now. So forgive me, if you do not like the idea of this crossover, or anything else. I mainly got the idea because FMA partially also belongs to Square Enix now, that and I can't help but love the idea, because I think it has merit. Of course a lot of you will be questioning on what kind of timeline this could possibly be taking place, well for Kingdom Hearts it takes place right after Sora and the gang get out of Monstro, and after the cutscene with Riku getting super Heartless powers (GREEN! WEEE!) and Kairi is comatose, for the Full Metal Alchemist line, it's like all the worlds Sora and the gang have visited, just right near the beginning, so for Full Metal Alchemist it will take place right at the first episode in Loire. Before you ask, no, there is no keyhole in the FMA world, but that's because from what I understand of the series there are two parts of it, and the two parts are split apart from the ethereal "Gate" or at least from what I can understand, I could be entirely wrong, I would love to be corrected. Also the Homunculi will NOT be able to get control over the heartless in the future, because from what I understand they have no actual 'hearts' for the heartless to want to prey upon, so it wouldn't make sense for the heartless to even sense them, so they also wouldn't be able to be manipulated by any of the Homunculi (nor do I think they would have the desire to try, since there will only be one of the heartless (which I will have made-up) with the power of alchemy). Also of course, don't expect exact content because I'm not the kind of person who can remember all of that kind of stuff exactly, nor the same events, for example, there may be something Edward says to Rose that happened later but will happen earlier, so forgive me for my silly mistake about out-of-sequence stuff.

So without further adieu!

I do not own Kingdom Hearts, nor do I own Full Metal Alchemist

Only spoilers that can possibly come from anywhere is if you have not played KH, or seen the episodes of FMA on Cartoon Network (asides from my spoiler-filled note up top).

And everything after Monstro in this fanfic will not take place, and so therefore makes this story an AU, as Kingdom Hearts does the same to any world it goes to, the same applies for FMA.

There will be more then likely shounen-ai between Riku and Sora, and as well as Roy and Edward (though that will be very less implied, as I will try to keep them as canon as I can possibly can).

And on we go!

**_Treaded Steps_  
I.**

"AGH!" The loud panicked yells of the only three occupants of the gummi ship flung foreword from the sudden shot from the large whale known as Monstro. Sora tried to gain his balance as he stumbled around in the newly built gummy ship, but failed extremely as the sneeze that Monstro had used to force them out. More yells continued throughout the ship as Donald was flung to the side that boosted the speed of the ship and as he slid down the wall with a pained grunt, the level to control such a thing came flying down as well. Goofy and Sora soon joined Donald to the side of the ship, their yells continued to wane through the air. It wasn't before too long before the power started to run out, a quiet sound of the engine stopping completely (which made all three fly foreword) showed that the power for the gummi ship had been completely exhausted. Sora was the first to get up and moan, coursing a hand through his dark chocolate hair.

"Darnit!" Came the curse from Donald's mouth as he went to survey the conditions of the gummi ship, and in anger Donald kicked the control panel. Yells came as the ship flew upside down (or it may have been right side up, Sora wasn't sure from that terrible tumble) as they fell down from the floor they were on a few moments ago.

"Owwww..." Sora couldn't help but complain slightly, as his neck got a slight crick in it as he stared at the galaxy upside down. Sora's feet, legs and everything thereafter soon followed him as he fell into a comfortable position. Sora frowned a bit, staring at the stars that were in front of the small window they had for the gummy ship.

"Hyuck, where do you think we are?" Goofy's voice came slightly, of which Sora decided to ignore as the stars looked strange to him.

"I don't know." Donald replied to him, the usual gruff manner that he would, sounding angry from such a question. Sora had finally decided to get up and looked closer at the strange stars.

"Hey look, there's a world nearby!" Sora pointed out the faint outline of a broken sphere far from where the gummi ship actually was. Donald scoffed lightly, looking down at the broken looking world, and Goofy stared with his usual dull look of contemplating. "We can probably stop there for awhile."

"Why would we need to do something like that?" Donald spat out, his gaze narrowed slightly angrily at the thought as Sora pouted at the short duck.

"We'll need to stop for food you know? We can't stay up here waiting for the fuel to recharge!" Sora complained back, pointing out a point that he usually never would, "Besides, the heartless's ships will find us sooner or later."

"Well we can just blow them away!"

"You know we haven't been able to grab more missiles from the other ships like we always do, all the ships were like decoys or something!" Sora argued, his mind mainly on his stomach for the moment. But Donald was as stubborn as Sora, and knew that going to the world, even to _wait_ in it, would somehow do some meddling in the world. It was bad enough that they've meddled with the four worlds beforehand, so who was to say what would happen down there?

"No way." Donald repeated, folding his arms stubbornly with a glare away. Sora groaned with emotion and turned away, repeating Donald's stature, and said nothing but did have a strangely ugly look on his face. Goofy looked at both of them very slowly, as though he didn't quite get what the argument was over, they both held really good points, so Goofy voiced his opinion.

"But Donald, what if the king is down there?" Donald gave a big phooey, to him it would be like the last time they had this type of argument, a big wild goose chase. Sure, they had found a lot of gummi's for the building of the strong ship they had now, but it was all incredibly frustrating and no King Mickey!

"Well at any rate-" Sora started, but then froze as there was a loud booming noise to the side of the ship, making the three fly. Panicked yells came surrounding the inside build of the ship once again as repeated missiles of the heartless. It took a few moments but Sora stood up to start turning the wheel to fire what few missiles they had, if they were lucky the blow from the missiles unto the heartless ships would blow more missiles for them to grab and defend themselves. **IF** they were lucky. Sora started to test his luck, gripping at the wheel tightly as his friend's bodies went flying around, as he struggled to turn. The force of the missiles and the strength of the gummi ship did not last long. The ship started spinning round and around, Sora didn't fly with Goofy and Donald as he kept a tight grip on the wheel as the damage to the ship was starting to make some of the gummi pieces fall off. "You guys! Grab unto something!" Sora managed to cough out, concerned for the two, fear starting to build up in his eyes.

The rest happened so slowly and yet in real time was so fast that Sora wasn't sure if it really was happening in the first place. Heat surrounded the ship, as the ship had stopped tumbling around and the gummi blocks that had fallen from the ship created a large hole. Fear built up in Sora as missiles came flunging foreword into the hole, cries of pain surrounded Sora's ears as he was forced against the window. Sora watched, terrified as he saw a most horrible sight, as well as cries of such pain that Sora slowly tried to convince himself this wasn't really happening. Before he knew it though, the glass under the window started to break, the threatening sound of its cracking and foaled very quickly with the loud shuddering noise of it breaking all while being sucked into the gravitating space, Sora followed after it. The last thing he was aware of was three small targeted missiles, flying to him, each hitting a point in his body and he had blacked out at the terrible mass of pain that gathered in his senses. Sora fell to the new world, the gravity being extremely strong, the overbearing feel of heat against his skin and the terrible aches in both his legs and left arm. Sora closed his eyes and kept them closed.

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_Well this was getting better...really..._

Sure Riku had to convince himself very badly that these words would keep him going, but his inner voice sounded stupid to even himself. Riku sighed inwardly, trying to shove off all of his emotions so the tricky heartless wouldn't dare try to steal his heart. Riku was not weak-hearted or wanted something like revenge against some power of the light, Riku was very different then the people he was currently on board with. Well at least he had basic control over them and their idiocies, really for being twice as old as he is, Captain Hook was a complete and utter moron. Riku sighed this time outwardly, and felt the strange presence of the heartless crawling around in him, wanting to be let out, or perhaps something else. What it was really, Riku didn't know, nor did he really care, he would manipulate the darkness to save Kairi.

Who was lying down straight next to him, there were no looks of emotion nor barely a body move to even show she was alive, but Riku was hopeful...like he had been for Sora. Riku then growled to himself outloud, angry as he felt a sudden clench within his heart, which the heartless (from what he could sense in his mind) seemed to enjoy the strange emotion they hadn't seen. Riku felt betrayed, he had told Sora that he had found Kairi, but still Sora kept with those _stupid_ **idiotic** half-brained **_MORONS_**! How could Sora do such a thing to him? After all the years they've known each other...it was terrible, and the heartless relished the frustration that was building within Riku's tense heart. Now that Riku took the time to think about it (since he really had no choice, unless he wanted to listen to the stupid pirate talk of Captain Hook's crew), why was he given these powers in the first place? What good could come out from him having the power of darkness within his hand and grip? Didn't they know he was an all-around good guy? That after he managed to find Kairi's heart, he would just leave?

Didn't they realize that?

Riku pushed his very beautiful silver hair a bit away from his eyes, frustrated about the subject and turned to stare at Kairi, for the strange reason that looking at her comforted him. It made Riku laugh as he thought about the time they all had spent on Destiny Island, oh it was kind of funny how he and Sora would fight over her because she was like the little sister they had always wanted. Riku frowned suddenly as he felt the ship give a jerk to a direction that he _knew_ wasn't planned for the trip. Immediately Riku got up, his slight impassive self-showing face as he walked up on board.

"What's going on?" Riku demanded, holding himself as the ship gave another unpleasant jerk into a weird direction.

"Nothing of course," Captain Hook smoothly said (his hook buried into the wall besides him, Riku noted), "Why don't you go back down to the resting quarters?" Riku suspected him immediately of course, but said nothing as he walked back down, hoping that the pirate could at least commodore his own ship properly. But...just in case...Riku looked down at Kairi's near corpse and lifted her as softly as he could, handling her package tenderly because he didn't want her to maybe wake up in discomfort. Riku opened the couch that she had been lying down on to reveal a small cramped space that would fit the two if they squeezed in well enough. Riku privately begged Kairi for forgiveness and made his way in. Ow, what a comfortable pain. It was very silent as the creeks and other odd miscellaneous sounds of the ship were outside of the comfortable zone of the cramped darkness. If they _had_ been moving in a strange fashion, Riku was positive that he wouldn't be able to feel it because of the cramped space. It wasn't long of course before he started to hear panicked yells of Captain Hook's right-hand man, Smee, wasn't it? Riku didn't know nor did he really care, but tried to listen at the shrieking voice,

"Captain Hook! Captain Hook! The wormhole is pulling us towards it!"

"I know that Smee! Pull us away!" Captain Hook's panicked replied back angrily and Riku couldn't help but imagine the dark-haired pirate bandishing his hook to Smee and the poor short plumb man's glasses would be shaking off of his nose.

"We've been trying as hard as we can captain, but the winds of the wormhole have been pulling us in." Captain Hook scoffed angrily. Well of course the winds of a wormhole were strong enough to pull a ship into it, especially since there's no real wind in space, the only pull is gravity and that of wormholes. What was wrong with a wormhole anyway? Riku had been through one once and it wasn't even that bad, it just teleported him somewhere.

"Well try harder! You know very well that the structure of this vessel won't hold up in a wormhole!" Oh...Well that would indeed explain everything. How incredibly stupid. Well the panicked cries of...well...panic continued outside the small darkness, Riku wondered if he could possibly cast Aero to protect the small bed space. Riku wasn't panicking but he kept in the confined space just in case something bad _did_ happen. This was the best place for any type of protection. Riku though, had to admit that he froze in slight fear as there were tormented yells and a strange feeling that he had felt before when traveling through a wormhole. The sudden feeling of just being separated into tiny atoms and then the feeling of a sudden reassembling, but this time, it felt much worse and far slower to reassemble. Riku hissed at the terrible feeling that coursed through his entire being and froze even more as there was a seldom feeling as though they had stopped, and everything had been stripped away from him...very strange feeling.

Riku didn't dare move though, his eyes concentrating on Kairi through the darkness and then he felt another strange feeling as though they were being pulled somewhere. The even stranger feeling was that he could feel the heartless somehow encouraging this move, trying to protect them...strange, and suspicious. Riku sighed, keeping a very tight guard up but then was shocked as he was actually swung foreword within the cramped space, asking once again for Kairi to forgive him silently for the touchy-feely moment and flung the door of the bed, immediately expecting the worse...but found himself in a wide open like desert. The sun shining down upon his head and they were barely flouting upon the yellow/golden sun known as the sand. Riku stared and saw no civilization for miles, so he could only think of one thing that any normal person would,

"Where the hell am I?"

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It had been a whole week since she had found him, buried underneath some sand just barely outside of the town. The poor boy was really lucky she had found him in time, there really was a strange spectacle that whole day, and even though the light was out like always everyone could see stars in the sky and fireworks exploding in a spectacular way. The girl busied herself, her heart quickening as she offered her daily praises to the Sun God. The priest Cornello recognized this event as a blessing and symbol to the Sun God and implored all of the town people to do more that they could to show their humanity and have the Sun God bless them with more offerings. The girl smiled to herself hopefully, maybe she would hear his voice again...

"..." The pink/brown haired girl turned in surprise as she heard and saw blankets falling down from the boy's form standing up slightly. The tan girl grew extremely happy,

"You're finally awake! Praise Leto!" The girl clapped happily, a grin that seemed permanent on her face. The boy looked at her, one of his blazing blue eyes covered with a bandage as he had earned a wound on that side of the face. The boy looked at her strangely, but then again, the girl surmised, he probably thought he was gone for good. "I'm really glad." The girl finally came closer to the boy, brushing down her light tan dress and grinned again, "I'm Rose." The boy stared at her silently and his face looked disconcerted. "Is something wrong?" Rose asked, noticing that look and becoming concerned immediately.

"..." Rose saw the strange brunette boy start to open his mouth, but then a look of pain spread to his face and his mouth shut immediately. Rose's eyes widened, thinking that maybe he was a mute.

"Oh I'm sorry!" She immediately apologized, her concern building up even more, "You probably don't even know where you are! You're in the Church of the Sun God Leto, on the outskirts of Loire." No look of recognition came to the boy, instead he stared at Rose with the same tormented look. Rose frowned, unsure of what she could do to help out her visitor, "Are you hungry?" She asked, maybe hoping to see a gesture that maybe he recognized. The brunette stared for a second then seemed to nod very slowly, his stomach growling to help answer him. Rose couldn't help but smile cheerfully, "Okay then! I'll go get you some food!" Rose puffed up her chest proudly and moved out.

Sora watched the strange girl walk outside the room, it took awhile for Sora to get it through his brain that he was somewhere new, but...As much as Sora would like to try to think, he kept drawing blanks in his head. Rather large unfulfilled blanks that made him a little upset, earlier when he had tried to speak...he couldn't remember how. Large blanks that made no sense. Sora stared down at the makeshift bed he had been sleeping in, then turned slightly to get up...he fell. Sora's eyes widened, struggling to get back up now on the bed seeing as he could not move anywhere else but found the strength of only one hand helping him up. Sora stared at his right hand, seeing that it was still there, no problem but then...he slowly tore his gaze to his other arm and bit back a scream. Completely gone, the only remainder of there ever being a limb there was his shoulder and dressed wound. Sora could feel himself shaking, had the same thing happened to his legs? What-what could he do? Sora's shaking got worse, he noted as he swollen his Adam's apple hard. It wasn't long before Sora saw darkened spot on the floor come out of nowhere, he placed himself down carefully and stared at the spots, curious on what they could be.

Tear drops. Sora noted suddenly and fingered his face with his right hand, he could feel the watery raindrops dripping from his eyes. Sora had started to try to calm himself down, breathing timidly but his frame continued to shake and his face continued to cry.

"I'm back!" The cheerful voice was slightly warming to Sora's heart but then there was a gasp from the girl, "Oh no! Are you okay? You shouldn't try to move in your condition!" Rose seemed to try and stern across Sora's mind. Condition? Condition? What 'condition' did she mean? Sora looked up though, and Rose felt heart-broken as she saw that strange face racked up in such pain and terror, she started to feel very sympathetic. Rose struggled a smile at him and helped him back on the hardbound bed, which grew soft underneath Sora because of the blankets on top of it. "You probably don't even know that, do you? When I found you, I took you the medical examiner right away and your legs and left arm were completely shot." Rose frowned slightly, trying not to look cheerful about this, she wasn't at all, but struggling with a smile like this just seemed...wrong..."And they had to cut them all off." Rose finished slightly and followed to see Sora's eyes, they were very fierce blue, such a scary blue that made Rose think he was a child of the sky.

Silence overcame the two and Rose tried to find the right thing to say to the strange boy in front of her...maybe..."Since you're awake we can take you to an automail engineer, I'm sure she would give you a pair of legs and an arm. We couldn't get them to you before because if you perform automail on someone sleeping it could damage their nervous system." This didn't seem to calm Sora down any at all and Rose felt very uncomfortable. So, not thinking of anything else she gave Sora the small plate of food and walked out, closing the door. Sora stared for a few seconds...then remembered something else. Crying, now he remembered what those tears were even more and he leaned against the pillow and racked up tears. He hadn't had a good cry in a long time...or had he? He...really couldn't remember...anything...Rose closed her eyes and decided to get more of her daily offerings for the shrine, a frown appearing upon her face as she moved out from the church.

So the day went on, Rose bought her offerings and smiled, telling everyone the refugee she had found a week ago had finally woken up, the ones that heard the tale was happy for Rose and told her congratulations. Rose nodded and then walked out, she would make the stop at the very small automail shop they had in Loire but stopped a few moments as the Priest Cornello's daily prayer came blazing all across the town, Rose grinned slightly and continued to walk. Soon she came across one of the many small concession stands (as they called themselves) and smiled at the man she knew.

"How have you been doing Rose?" The proprietor of the stand grinned at her and Rose smiled back, telling the tale,

"I've been doing fine, thank you. Oh, you know that boy I found on the outskirts of the town? He finally woke up!" Rose said very excited, her grin brightening despite herself.

"That's great news Rose! Tell me, how is the young lad?" It was that time that Rose took the time to look at the people sitting at the stand, several villagers she knew of course but there were two strangers at the edge of the stand. When Rose stared at both of them, she had to keep herself from not staring out of pure shock and curiosity. There was one male and one female, the male had shoulder-length bright silver hair, which seemed to highlight within the sun painfully, his eyes were a piercing kind with a strange color surrounding in the iris, he also wore the strangest clothes she had ever seen. Then there was a girl, she seemed to be sleeping on the male's shoulder, with the lack of any other action in the girls body. The girl had the strangest piercing amber-red hair that she had ever seen and was also wearing strange clothes. "Rose?" Rose stepped out of her daze and smiled at the keeper,

"He's doing great, though he was very shocked because we had to cut off his limbs."

"Ah, how is he taking it? And did he tell you why that happened in the first place?" Rose bit her lip and became silent,

"I think he's mute..." A silence overtook the small stand before a small nod came,

"Okay then, well you say hello for me, will you Rose?"

"Of course, thank you. See you!"

"Hey wait! Rose!" The girl waited for a second, turning back to stare at the older man, "These two have just arrived in town and need a place to stay, can you give it to them?" Rose smiled gently and walked over to the two he had signified. Just as she thought, it was the silver-haired man and the girl. The other picked up the girl, who moved a bit in his arms,

"Hello! I'm Rose!" Rose spoke, trying to prevent from a cold silence. The boy looked at her silently and nodded,

"I'm Riku, and this is Kairi." He pointed to the one he was holding and made a look for Rose to go on. Rose nodded and started moving but then frowned,

"I have to make a stop at a shop for a quick second, I have to get automail parts for my guest." Riku nodded and Rose was slightly impassive because he had just really no emotion, it was weird to stare at. So they made it to the shop and Rose did her best to ask for the parts and then went out and lead the way to the church. When they had reached the church, she noticed Riku staring at it very strangely, but thought he was just enjoying the landscape. Rose soon led Riku and Kairi to the guestroom and happily offered them the room, while walking off. Fear slightly came to her though, the way Riku was so impassive and how Kairi only moved if she was moved in her sleep was...like the dead...Rose shook her head of such thoughts and continued with her daily rituals.

Riku stared down the room, there were several benches and some makeshift beds (of which he immediately placed Kairi down on one of them) and examined the room. It took Riku awhile to release the tense feeling he felt surging through his blood and the clench of the heartless upon him. Riku took it upon himself to explore the room, but he was very surprised to see the guest of Rose.

"Sora!" Riku cried out, despite himself. The boy didn't move, his head looking down at his right hand blankly and Riku couldn't help but flinch as he saw no arm attached to Sora's shoulder. Riku immediately became overwhelmed with concern for his ex-bestfriend (that is what he told himself) and walked up to him carefully, "Sora? What happened to you?" Sora didn't face him for a few seconds, he just...played with his right hand. Riku could feel himself getting a bit impatient but continued to stare, waiting for Sora to pay attention. Sora then looked at Riku, and Riku was slightly stunned to see a bandage over his right eye and a misty blue eye that seemed to be full of fear. "Sora?"

"S...So..." Sora tried to repeat his name, his throat straining itself and Riku couldn't help but stare at Sora.

"Come on Sora! Snap out of it!" He scorned the younger but Sora seemed to hate these words as his face cautioned in pain.

"Soo...ra...?" Sora had finally managed to repeat and he looked up at Riku, in hope that the boy would stop yelling at him. Riku stared, recognizing that look nearly immediately, the look as though he was lost and couldn't find his way...that same desperate look...A long time ago, the legendary trio were still in a very young age and thought they were indestructible. Kairi was rather hungry and really wanted to know what a Gullwing's egg tasted like, Sora knew where there were plenty of Gullwings were and vouched to get the egg. Riku and Kairi had followed Sora to the place and Riku remembered staring up at Sora who was grinning happily and continued to climb until he got on the tree. Kairi tried to beg for Sora to come back down because she started to get concerned for the boy. Sora just replied with a 'I'll be okay' and found the egg, when he did he stood upon the top of the three, grin with victory but then his balance was completely cut off guard as an abrupt wind started building up. Riku could remember both he and Kairi screaming as Sora fell with a sickening thud and the egg following after. They immediately went to get help, crying the whole time as Sora stayed out for the entire day. The next morning, Riku and Kairi was relieved and happy to find that he was doing okay...except he had forgotten everything, even how to speak. His face...now resembled that terrible face that Sora would show before.

"Sora...do you remember me?" Riku asked calmly, pointing to himself as though the boy would need emphasis on this sensitive subject. Sora stared at him, his eyebrows knotted in worry and his eyes squinted slightly as he looked like he was trying to prevent himself from crying. Fear built around Riku's heart, not caring when the Heartless inside seemed to relish the delicious emotion, "What about her? Do you remember her Sora?" Riku asked, pointing over to the dead to the world Kairi, the same look came, though this time it looked more pathetic as Sora bit his lip.

"Sooo...raa..." He wailed, not knowing how to say anything else at the moment and he held his arm out, like a little baby child wanting to be picked up by his mother. Riku stepped closer and found that Sora had flung his arm around him, and the boy was now sobbing against his shirt. Riku froze for a second, the strange clench of desperation in his heart and he dared himself to hug Sora back, wanting to make the boy feel better. What the hell had happened to him to make him like this? Where the hell were those idiots, what was their name...Goofy and Donald...WHERE?

"Shhh Sora..." Riku tried to comfort him, as a strange feeling of rocking him back and forth as the boy hugging him with the one arm continued to cry, feeling very sad and pathetic.

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"He's not a mute, but he has amnesia?" Rose asked, staring over at Riku as the boy ate the rations that Rose had offered him.

"Yes, this happened to him when he was younger, last time it went away in a day or two," Riku couldn't remember, he just remembered the fear of Sora never being able to talk again, or the fear they wouldn't be able to play the same way again because Sora would probably think he and Kairi were complete and utter strangers.

"Really?" Rose asked as she frowned a bit. Riku stared over at her carefully, recognizing the dreaded tone,

"Yes...why?"

"It's been over a week since I've found him." Riku stared blankly at the strange girl, silently hoping that this wasn't the truth...if that was so...then maybe the effects were permanent this time? The simple thought made Riku's hair stand on end. Rose saw this look and nodded simply to answer the boy's silent question, frowning in concern. There were a few moments of silence then Rose started to speak again, "His name is Sora?"

"Yes."

"And you know him, well?" Riku nodded to answer this silently. Rose stared quietly then dared herself to ask, "Do you know what happened to him?" Riku kept silent for a few more seconds then stared up to the girl,

"No." Rose felt herself being frightened for some strange reason, the volume of that simple word was quiet but the tone to back it up...scared her for some really strange reason. Rose nodded carefully,

"Well the automail engineer should be here soon." She cheerfully said, averting the strange colored gaze of the other boy. She felt really nervous under his gaze, like God was judging her himself, but that wasn't possible, right?

"I've been meaning to ask, what is automail?" Riku asked casually, not knowing he shocked the other girl. Rose looked over at him with slight shock, Riku muttered slightly giving an excuse, "Where we used to live never managed with such a thing." Rose stared, though slightly shaken she nodded carefully,

"Well Automail has a lot of its uses, I don't know what they all are, but more commonly they're used as artificial limbs for people who have lost them." Rose carefully said, trying to test Riku. Riku nodded simply and looked away, over to stare at Sora who was just paying attention to his right hand again.

"How much will it cost?" Riku asked, willing to spend any munny that he had to replace for the cost for Sora. Rose blinked slightly then shook her head,

"I'm sure that the engineer wouldn't mind giving Sora the automail, so please don't worry about it." Riku simply nodded and turned to ignore Rose and walked back to Sora. Rose furrowed her gaze slightly, this was really so strange, only a week and there seemed to be human disasters around her, but...maybe if she continued praying, it would get better. Rose just nodded, desperate to try and make it all feel better. It wasn't that long when the engineer came, a grin on his face as he held up crafty parts of automail, and some medical stuff for preparation of the operation, the town wasn't all that prosperous, so they couldn't afford the cleanest way of attaching automail, but it would do. Rose then frowned a bit as the engineer explained that he would need someone to hold Sora down because the process of attaching the nerves to the skin was extremely painful and he needed Sora to stay down. Riku volunteered and Sora looked confused as Sora forced him down, gently but kept him down harshly. Rose ran out of the room, not exactly anxious to see a screaming Sora and Riku holding him down. Rose wondered silently weither she should have gone to get Kairi, but the girl seemed dead to the entire world when she was asleep.

It was moments later when Rose felt her heart clench as there was a loud overwhelming scream, pained yells came to attach themselves into the memories of Rose, she had never heard of such a frightening noise. This noise carried on for hours, Rose was surprised that she had just stood there, leaning against the door with a trembling body. Rose was more then surprised when the engineer came out, wiping his face out from sweat that built up,

"Job done, it's not the best job I've done but he kept jerking around," The man sighed slightly, "If there's any problems, tell me, alright Rose?" Rose nodded timidly, not showing the fact she had been there the whole time. The man left and Rose crept into the room.

"Sora." Rose blinked to hear the brunette speak his name in a slightly annoyed way, facing Riku with what appeared to be anger but more of a pout then anything else.

"I know, I know," Riku replied back, patting the boy on the head, "But isn't this better? You can move around now, and honestly, I wasn't going to carry you around everywhere, you are as heavy as a rock." Rose didn't quite understand this sentence and neither did Sora from his confused stare at Riku. The silver-haired man just rolled his eyes carefully then frowned slightly at Sora, pointing at himself, "Sora, do you remember me yet?"

"..." The pained looked appeared on Sora's face once again and Riku sighed, but Rose was surprised to find the impassive boy patting Sora's head,

"Don't push yourself, I'm sure you'll remember."

"Sora..." Sora replied back cutely and Rose almost giggled. She was slightly surprised as the stranger smiled at Sora, a strange and true smile as she could tell...Rose then walked in carefully, congratulating Sora for going through three automail attachments at once.

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"Hoo hee, hoo ha, haa." Riku stared at Sora with semi-wide eyes, never realizing how strange the boy was until that moment. Sora came lanking towards him in the room, holding up both of his hands and placing them on Riku's chest, "Riku, hoo hee, hoo ha, haa." A replaced look of a small smile overtook Riku's face, they had been staying there for awhile in Loire, at least until Riku felt Sora could travel correctly. Last night yesterday, Sora had remembered Riku's name and was jumping about happily at the fact that he remembered something as trivial as a name, but that didn't make Riku any less pleased. And now Sora was spouting out nonsense that he could not understand for the life of him. "Riku!" Sora jumped on Riku then, hugging him tightly and Riku felt a little dizzy as he could feel the lack of oxygen from Sora's tight automail arm.

"Ah...yeah Sora, hoo hee, hoo ha, haa." Riku tried to repeat to get the brunette off of him but only encouraged the boy to hug him tighter. "Ah...Sora..." Riku tried to tell him off but the lack of words came to him for the moment as Sora cuddled against Riku's chest happily. Riku sighed happily when Sora had finally let him go, Riku then watched Sora as he crawled down to Kairi to stare at the girl with wide eyes. A short smile came to Riku's face as Kairi's body seemed to react to the staring of Sora's piercing blue eyes. "Sora, do you remember her?"

"..." Sora grew silent again, though this time instead of becoming a pained look, a strong determined look focused on Sora's face. Riku smiled as Sora was trying to remember...but he knew better then to push it, so he patted the child-brained boy and just replied, "You'll remember eventually." This seemed to make Sora as happy as a puppy as he surprised Riku by jumping on him, with the heavy automail limbs that Sora had, they both fell to the ground, Riku being slightly crushed. There was a slight creak to alert Riku that someone was entering and he stared ahead, expecting Rose but still being on his guard, for all Riku knew, Maleficent and her gang of minion idiots were trying to find them. Riku didn't care right now, but he would have to use them later, he supposed. Luckily it was only Rose, accompanied with a rather small-looking blonde with bright gold eyes like his hair and someone walking in suit of armor. Sora seemed to sense the presence of the new guests and jumped up, stretching his automail limbs and Riku rolled his eyes as he heard the miscellaneous creaks of a bad job done.

"We weren't interrupting anything were we?" Rose asked curiously as Riku got up to stop Sora from stretching anymore. Riku shrugged and Sora just replied cutely with a great grin,

"Sora!" Riku stared more closely at the newcomers, paranoid as he was when he first met Rose. The blonde was short, Riku guesstimated 4'9 with gold blonde hair that was far brighter then what Riku remembered of Tidus back at Destiny Island, and there was a part of the boy's hair that stood up, bringing the other's height up to be a little taller, Riku recognized the golden eyes set into a permanent narrowed stare, he also studied his clothes, a red jacket that seemed to have a hoodie attached to it while he wore black underneath the jacket. Riku slightly smirked as he saw white gloves on both of the shorter's hands, it seemed gloves were also a sort of passion here as well. Riku looked up at the much taller person in the armor, the armor was a basic blue-green tint of full-plate with a white loin cloth to block out unnecessary sightings of appendages but Riku noticed that the armor was decorated with a red symbol on the left of its shoulder with a strange symbol.

"Well, this is Edward and Alphonse Elric," Rose introduced the two right asides from her, "They're here to stay for awhile like you three."

"Sora!" Sora introduced himself quite cheerfully, though he received a slightly odd look from Edward but it didn't seem to be offending.

"This is Sora," Rose laughed happily, pointing for the boy casually then she looked over at Riku who had gone to sit near Kairi, staring closely at the new strangers. "That is Riku, and the one sleeping is Kairi." Edward grinned just as cheerfully,

"Nice to meet you." He said politely thought Riku wasn't really fooled by the tone he may have heard from the blonde's voice, then again, he might have imagined it. Sora jumped up again, this time towards Alphonse, seeming to be curious about the armor. Alphonse, inside the armor seemed to be slightly embarrassed by this somehow, Riku rolled his eyes slightly as Sora's clunky automail echoed throughout the small chamber.

"Sora?" Sora asked, looking at Alphonse in confusion and curiosity, Riku then proceeded to think it was because Sora hadn't seen someone in armor before, even before his memory got shot. Alphonse seemed to panic a bit, shyly trying to speak back to Sora but Sora didn't seem to get the idea that Alphonse was becoming uncomfortable. Riku stood up then but was a bit surprised to find that Edward had pulled Sora away from his brother and pointed simply back at Alphonse,

"Al." Sora grinned back at Edward and Riku couldn't help but think that the brunette and the blonde could get along very well.

"Al, Al! Hoo hee, hoo ha, haa!" Sora jumped cheerfully and Riku noticed that the boy seemed to be most comfortable flying in the air.

"Uhh..." Alphonse tried to speak, looking (well if an armor could look like) like he wasn't completely sure on how to handle the situation but didn't seem at all hostile. Riku continued walking, placing his hands within the new clothes that Rose had given him as they had been donated, a long tan white shirt and boring tan pants.

"Sora, leave Al alone." Riku said kindly to the brunette and the boy replied with another jump and settling next to Riku, hiding behind him now as though he was more curious of something but was too scared to try and ask. Riku smiled tamely then faced Rose, "Isn't it time to clean Sora's bandage?" Rose blinked then panicked a bit,

"Oh goodness! I had almost forgot! Excuse me," She bowed to Edward and ran outside the small storage room for people and they were left alone. Riku stared over carefully then a careful smile came to his face, Edward seemed to return it as they both seemed to be the higher thought within the room.

"Sora?" Sora asked, tugging on Riku's short sleeve, looking confused because of the quiet stares they gave each other. Riku looked back at Sora and just smiled calmly,

"Well, we'll be taking our rest," Edward casually said, shrugging his shoulders up and Riku sensed something inhumane about him for a second as the heartless cooed at the doubts and fears they continued to feel around the city. Riku became very paranoid at that moment but still sat down, on the ground next to Kairi's makeshift bed. Sora seemed to sense the fact that there was a very uncomfortable silence and Riku wanted him next to him, so Sora ran to join with Riku leaning against Kairi's make-shift bed. Rose quickly came back with a bandage and changed Sora's bandage that was still covering his eye, Riku didn't stare, not wanting to make Sora feel uncomfortable and then Rose went to the small shrine in the room and started to pray. Rose seemed to be a very religious girl, not that Riku really cared, it's just he had never seen anyone so dedicated to worshipping and proving their faith. Riku then noted silently as Edward spoke silently, "Give worship and pray everyday, and you'll be able to resurrect the dead?"

"Yeah, something like that." Rose turned back to the questioning blonde, an eager smile upon her face. Riku stared, a bit surprised by Rose, she was trying to resurrect the dead? Now that was never a possibility that Riku had never even thought about, then again, he had never really lost anyone important in his life. The only time the trio had witnessed some type of death was Sora's father when they were seven. Sora was never really the same after that, but he would cover the thought with just playing with he and Kairi. "You know, you should come and listen to Priest Cornello's sermon, I'm sure it would help you understand a bit more, and if you started praying you could probably grow taller!" Rose said cheerfully, being just a few inches taller then the boy. Edward twitched and Riku was a bit taken off by a temper that he had never seen even from Maleficent's goons as Alphonse held the blonde back from doing something that could cause damage to the religious girl. "You should come too Riku and Sora." Rose suggested, bending down a bit to stare directly at the two. Riku was about to respectfully decline but then Sora grinned and hugged the girl,

"Sora!" Riku held his head, already seeing Sora's trouble-making personality was drifting back to his normal self. Rose seemed to be as cheerful as Sora and Alphonse had managed to calm Edward down enough for the two to still be sitting on their bench, staring over at the four.

And so after a few hours of resting, Rose dragged all of them (except for Kairi, who Riku said she was still really tired) to the outside of the temple, where Priest Cornello (A tall old looking man with his eyes set on a permanent closed position) was standing at the front of the temple. There was a loud mass of people gathering to watch the priest and Riku just folded his arms, for once grateful for the black gloves because he would have pierced his skin otherwise in annoyance. Sora was standing still, watching uncharacteristically quiet. Riku observed Edward standing upon some strange trunk that seemed to be there, while Alphonse just stared carefully and Rose was still smiling. Riku couldn't help but jump a bit as the priest made a small flower into a mid-size tree, what a strange kind of spell!

"Brother, do you think?"

"That's definitely alchemy." A scowl crossed the blonde's face and it was then Riku noticed that the boy had long hair in a braid, well that was funny...

"Alchemy?" Rose asked before Riku could, though the fifteen-year-old was grateful for it inwardly.

"Yes, Alchemy is a science based on equivalent exchange, like when I fixed that radio earlier, I was able to fix that because all the parts were there to be form the radio again." Alphonse said in a tone for Rose to understand, thankfully this was also true for Riku. Well that sounded interesting.

"And that hack job up there is ignoring the first rule."

"First rule?" Rose asked as Alphonse sighed within his armor.

"Like I said earlier, alchemy is a science built around equivalent exchange. The first law is that if you want something, something must be taken away to counter it. What my brother means is that your priest is ignoring this rule."

"Well did you ever think that he may have the blessings of Leto?" Rose crossed her eyes angrily, seeming to be upset about this. A scoff came from Edward as he seemed to refuse to believe this.

"It's that stone." Edward replied, a fire suddenly starting in his eyes, a fire that made Rose frown even more. The priest was then offered a dead bird, Riku unwarily flinched as he could barely see the dead body, but then the priest covered both his hands over the limp body and uncovered his hands, revealing a fresh and alive bird. The bird took off, giving off gasps within the audience.

"Well Edward, how about that? It's a blessing from Leto." Riku doubted, and from the looks on Edward's face, so did he. But Rose seemed quite angry with this, Riku sighed, about to go back into the temple but he turned and found no Sora at his side. Immediately he panicked,

"Sora?" He asked, turning his around and around to try and find the spiky-haired brunette. Rose, Edward, and Alphonse seemed to sense the strange sense of urgency and looked over the crowd to try and also find him, it didn't take long before they found Sora right in front of Cornello with a fierce expression on his face.

"Hm?" Cornello stared carefully at the youth, who continued to look very determined and was surprised when the youth had grabbed both of his hands (of which he tried to yank away but the presence of the crowd made him feel uncomfortable) and place them on his forehead.

"Mem...mem...mem-o...memories..." Sora spoke quietly, struggling with every syllable and the whole crowed stared. "Memo...ries..." Sora was shaking, begging for Cornello to perform this strange magic and give him back the blank spots within his head, give him the knowledge of knowing confidence in speaking. Sora then stared up, his eye still very fierce, "Memories." The whole crowd of spectators seemed surprised by this as Riku calmly started to walk for Sora. Cornello was surprised at first, but then just smiled,

"Child, the reason your memories have left you is so a lesson is taught to you from God, and I'm afraid I can't take back a lesson that God is trying to teach you." Sora's hands slipped from Cornello's and the priest retreated the hand with a ring on it while patting the sad youth on top of the head. There seemed to be sad 'awws' within the crowd but Riku wasn't fooled as he walked asides to Sora, grabbing the warm human hand. The only reason he wouldn't do it was because he _could't_ do it, liars disgusted Riku. Riku pulled Sora away from the priest and he saw Sora's gaze very down, as though he was trying to cover the miserable look Riku _knew_ he had.

"Don't worry, they'll come back to you, sooner or later." Riku saw Sora's pierce blue eye look at him, a strange look of frustration he had only seen when he defeated Sora in sparring,

"So...soo...sooner." Sora replied back, very determined and Riku couldn't help but smile back as Sora struggled with it. Sora was really trying so hard, wasn't he? That was kind of relieving, but Riku was slightly afraid of what would happen if Sora regained all of his knowledge back...But no need to worry about such a thing right now.

"I'm sorry Sora," Rose said as they reached back the way to the group, Sora not moving from Riku's grip on his human hand as the boy just grinned back at her. Riku then blinked as Sora gripped his hand tightly, a sudden hostile look appeared on Sora's face. The entire group seemed to be confused by this but Sora pushed Riku down as a strange large fireball appeared out of nowhere, just stopping where Riku had been seconds earlier.

"WHAT THE HELL?" Edward, along with several adults in the audience yelled as the remainder of the fireball was a small sized rock. Riku recognized that type of rock immediately and glared over at the large heartless, the evolution of the fat body heartless. Riku got up, ready to take care of it but was surprised to find Sora charging in immediately. Riku almost hit himself as it seemed that Sora's heroic personality was still a deep part of him no matter what. The heartless that came originally from Agrabah puffed his breath up and fired another fireball, this time though Sora blocked it with his left automail arm, ricocheting it back as a counter-attack. Sora ducked under and rolled slightly and out of nowhere, the similar tune of a keyblade swung itself many times against the back of the heartless's head. Sora overtook the heartless with many air-combos to the head with the strange blade called Three Wishes and not before long, Sora had overcame the heartless and it disappeared in a mix of purple and pink mist. Everyone stared at his or her new strange hero who stared over what the heartless had left and looked back up at everyone.

"Sora, what the hell were you thinking?" Riku couldn't help but yell at him, stomping up to the boy angrily, slapping his head once in anger, "What if you didn't have the keyblade?" Riku yelled, momentarily forgetting the boy didn't have his memory. Sora stared at him with deep-settled confusion, rubbing his head in pain, hadn't he done a good thing? He protected him and even defeated the enemy...though whatever this weapon came out of nowhere, it made Sora feel slightly comfortable. Sora stared back at Riku though with a slight puppy-eyed stare, confused on what he had done wrong.

"Oh Sora, thank goodness you did that!" Rose came up though, interrupting whatever response Riku was going to give back to the brunette, she held Sora close to her, hugging him out of gratefulness. Riku looked over to Edward and Alphonse, a suspicious set curious glare was coming from Edward's eyes and Alphonse simply stayed at his brother's side.

"What kind of weapon is that?" Edward decided to finally question, his eyes continuing to be narrowed and as a paranoid that Riku couldn't help but recognize.

"A special weapon Sora made a long time ago," Riku smoothly lied, "He managed to make it possible to gather materials around the weapon to make it a full blade." Sora seemed to frown at this for a second, but Riku just held him still, tempting the other not to do anything that would spoil the lie.

"Really?" Edward asked, an eyebrow raising up, still in a suspicious fashion and Riku just simply stared back. There were a few more moments of angry silence and contemplating before Rose screamed, four heads whiplashed to her screaming voice as a shadow from the ground held tightly around her ankle. Rose immediately tried to wretch her ankle from the creepy hand that was holding her but its strength was too much. Riku frowned, beckoning to the heartless inwardly, willing it to disappear, and holding Sora tightly in one place. The shadow heartless's grip went slack and slipped back into the shadows, Rose falling down as though in exhaustion.

"What are those things?" Rose demanded, looking up to Riku, as though he would know the answer. And Riku did, but he couldn't answer that question, otherwise he would give away a part of himself.

"I don't know." Riku replied, lying through his teeth easily, turning around a bit, "We should probably head back to the temple."

"Will the temple protect us?" Rose asked, then looking around, concerned as she saw the villagers standing there, inwardly panicking while a lot more of them were asking Cornello for safety.

"Probably being inside a building period will keep them away, but who knows?" Riku replied simply, gripping Sora's hand tighter, of which the boy whimpered slightly and started walking towards the large church, regardless if anyone listened to him or not. These heartless were coming from a different source then him, a weaker source...but still an annoyance. He would have to leave as soon as possible, and when he and Sora got some time alone, he would have encourage Sora to not summon the keyblade ever again, if the two were going to fight, it would be only he to fight. Not at all too long as Riku reached where he wished to and he felt his heart clench tighter as Sora whined,

"Riiikuu...ow..." Riku did not like causing pain to his friend ('EX' Riku reminded himself, clearly in denial), but it had to be done if he were to keep Sora away from the strange heartless. Riku sighed slightly, sitting down by Kairi once again, Sora following him, and tuned the world out as the light clanks of the temple doors and the slightly louder walking of Alphonse in the armor.

"You know, he's just using you." Came the muttered voice of Edward and an angered response yelled back at him,

"I don't care what you say Edward! I believe in Priest Cornello, he's brought life to this broken town, and he's resurrected many people before Cain! It's not 'alchemy' as you say it is! It's God's will!" Rose just simply yelled, refusing to hear the blonde and she ran out. A loud sigh resonated from Alphonse armor,

"Niisan, did you really have to..."

"It doesn't really matter to me," Edward just grunted back and Riku heard Edward's thick steps lightly coming towards them and Riku stared evenly at Edward's short legs. Riku's stare hardened, there was something the way his right leg moved...that was what made the other seem inhumane, maybe...

"Hey Sora," Edward addressed the brunette and Riku glared rather protectively, "Do you mind if I see your weapon?" Luckily, Sora still had the weapon, it had just been lying next to him as he had placed it there earlier, not knowing what else to do with it. Sora just looked up almost cutely then gave the blade to Edward. Riku's gaze narrowed even more as Edward examined it quietly, as though trying to figure on what made it work, especially with the lie Riku had used earlier. Riku almost smirked though as Edward tried to see how to handle it, he wasn't doing so very well at it. Sora had begun a rather lost look on his face as Edward continued to stare at the blade.

"I believe Sora doesn't want you touching it anymore." Riku simply said, as he saw Sora's face knotted in slight worry. Edward blinked back but then handed it carefully back to Sora (who seemed exhilarated to get it back) and turned to start walking back to his brother, but left with the quiet words,

"Interesting." Those words made Riku darken considerably.

--------------------------------

Not even a few hours had gone by, and Riku had learned that the Elric bunch, were the biggest troublemakers he had ever seen in his entire life. And that would defeat even prankster wits of Wakka and Tidus! But my god, Edward and Alphonse Elric were so _much_ more smarter with how they played their tricks. Of course that doesn't really explain what happened, well earlier through that day slowly turning into night, it seemed that Edward had somehow bugged Rose. Somehow bugged her to the point of where an ambush was placed on the two. Originally it just started with the trio, with where they usually were and Rose stomping angrily into the room with Edward following after. Riku was aware of a conversation going on between the two, probably of the same matter they had argued about earlier, when a strange sound echoed throughout the whole room. Rose screamed, and Riku stood up immediately, telling Sora to keep down, immediately getting ready for a battle. Riku was beyond shocked to see Alphonse's armor head spawled by the ground and Edward in a very defensive mode.

"Why are you doing this?" Rose asked, fear tensing in her voice, it was then Riku followed her stare and found the one who shot at Alphonse, probably from the back and with something Riku had only encountered with Captain Hood, a gun. Though a far stranger model then Hook had.

"Cornello has told us that Leto has said to take them out, he says they're sinners that need to be taken care of."

"But...but why do that to Alphonse?" Rose asked, in hysterics and Riku started to tread closer, completely ready to summon the power of darkness he knew he could take advantage of.

"Heh, so the priest is worried about us, eh? Good." Edward commented, smirking over at the minion, of who smirked,

"Don't be so confident, you'll be joining your brother soon." Edward didn't seem to be at all shocked as he pointed the gun directly at him, in fact there was the surprisingly smooth sound of Alphonse's voice and the surprised gasps,

"So the priest thinks we're trouble, hm?" Riku knew he was staring wide-eyed, as was Rose but Edward went on fairly normal, and kicked up Alphonse's head and conveniently threw it into the direction to Alphonse, but ended up knocking out the man with the gun and Alphonse almost cutely ((A/n: Ahhh, sorry! I just had to! I love Al! -n-n-)) said, "I got it! I got it!" Riku stared quietly, though very stunned and Rose voiced her opinion as she stepped back, shaking terribly,

"Wh...what?" Alphonse attached the helmet back to the rest of the armor to complete the set,

"This is the way I am Rose."

"But...but...how is that possible?" Rose almost demanded, but her voice was soft and her body was shaking so much. Sora stood up carefully, looking more confused then ever and just stayed right behind Riku bashfully.

"This is what happens when you try to cross into God's territory, don't you see Rose? You will never be able to resurrect the dead." Edward replied back to her, his yellow-golden stare trying to get the point across to the refusing girl. Rose stood there for a few seconds and then she ran off, Riku could see the faint drip of tears following after her as in footsteps.

"Ah! Rose!" Alphonse yelled after as the two Elric brothers followed after her. Riku frowned, how very strange. So did this mean that Alphonse did not really have a body, was he like the heartless? Heartless do not have any real bodies, they were made as though they were tools, darkness formed illusions of bodies and made them solid to the hit by the strength or lack of, your heart. But the strangest thing was that Riku could not sense any sign of darkness within the 'illusion' of the metal body as it clanked away...wait a minute, there was only one type of armor that clanked away that way...

"SORA!" Riku couldn't help but yell, running after the boy, who was intent on chasing after Rose as the other two were, "GET BACK HERE!" Sora ignored him, which Riku didn't find all that surprising. Riku cursed to himself and at Sora many times, of which the brunette continued to ignore and try to out race his friend. Now before, they were pretty evenly matched when it came to running, but it seemed that the new automail legs of Sora's made him run even faster, then again, maybe that's because they probably didn't feel the strain of running outright as they were right now. Riku flinched as Sora turned with a very loud screech, grabbing on the wall with his automail hand and swiveling to the left, where Riku assumed that Sora was still following Edward and Alphonse. Riku followed after easily, not having to do any actions like Sora had too with his light limbs and tried to stare ahead. Nothing but darkness, how could Sora tell if he was still following the Elric brothers? Riku supposed he would have to trust with Sora's sense of direction...On the other hand...Sora's sense of direction was as good as a person trying to find their car keys when they're going to be late for work, Riku's pace fastened. Riku found the travel down the strange dark hall very monotonous except for the loud clanks of Sora's automail ahead of him, but Riku followed faithfully, when Sora turned he would turn. For some reason this pathway seemed to take a long time, at least in Riku's mind. The scented voices and coos of the heartless begging to him to be let out, especially when they sensed the keyblade so close by. Riku refused of course, his heart strong enough to thwart off the illusions of the heartless within his mind. Riku's attention was drawn away as Sora had finally fell, moaning at his faulty turn.

"Sora..." Sora moaned, his lanky automail parts creaking even more as Riku had finally caught up. Riku sighed and helped the boy up,

"We shouldn't concern ourselves with such things Sora," Riku replied back to him, as Sora started to brush off some dust he had gotten from the fall...now that Riku was thinking about it, the hall looked very old and unused.

"Sora!" Sora complained back and Riku imagined that Sora was trying to convince him that they _had_ to do something, as though the situation had called for such dramatics. Riku frowned back, folding his arms clearly, and as he was about to speak there was a loud roaring sound throughout the entire church. The two both sensed trouble and took the same way, dashing down the hall until they saw a door half-way open, the only problem was that there was a huge load of sand blocking the entry-way...well that wasn't a problem for Sora. Riku stared, bedazzled as Sora started to wack the sand away, clearing a pathway as soon as Sora rushed in. Riku couldn't help but stand in the sand sprayed mounds that had built by the sides of him for a few seconds, then he simply walked in, summoning a wicked blade that was in no doubt a real sword.

"What's the matter? Can't sink your teeth into me?" Riku blinked very slowly as he witnessed the sight of a very large lion looking thing (Riku wasn't all too sure, it had parts that weren't that of a lion) attached to Edward's right arm, his arm stuck out entirely just as the lion was chewing it.

"But that's impossible!" Riku's eyes narrowed as he saw Cornello high above on some type of stand with Rose right next to him, both looked very stunned, "The only way that could be possible is-" Edward smirked up at Cornello and threw his arm away, the lion thing jerking with it and kicked at it harshly with his left leg. The lion thing was thrown away, whimpering at the kick...strange. There was a strange loud ripping sound as Edward tore his jacket away (not that it had been damaged before) and revealed...his right arm was automail and a strange glint from the few bulbs electricity revealed that Edward's left leg was also automail.

"Unless I have automail, right?" Edward smirked confidently then stared up to Rose fiercely, "Do you see now? This is what happens when you try to resurrect the dead! Are you willing to sacrifice it? Are you?" Edward questioned just as fiercely as his glare. Rose stared with wide eyes and Riku wasn't exactly sure what was going on, but he didn't sense anything good from it, the only good thing about this situation was that Sora kept close to him, for once.

"HAHA! I get you now Elric!" The priest laughed out, "You did the most forbidden thing, you tried to perform human alchemy! And this is what happened to you, for crossing in God's territory!" The priest then quieted for a bit, "I had always wondered why the state would name someone that had the stance of a child the Full Metal Alchemist, but now I know that it is literal! You are the Full Metal Alchemist!" Cornello yelled out, as though victoriously but Edward didn't seem amused by this. The slight clanks of Alphonse joining in his ranks (Where had he gone?) soon came as an echo came across,

"Well now that you know, we'll ask you again, hand over the stone." Stone? Riku was getting more and more confused by the moment, and being confused irritated him more then anything else. But he didn't voice his opinion and continued watching the scene taking place right before him, Sora was a bit less timid as he stepped out of the shadows of Riku's back. The conversation carried on, and Riku carried upon himself to actually listen intently, curious about this 'stone' as Alphonse had put it.

"What stone?" The priest decided to play innocent and the whole room either grew in silence or annoyance, Riku wasn't sure of which but the disturbing crossed his mind and tended to lead him into agitation.

"Don't give me that crap!" Edward yelled back, obviously growing angry at the incorporation of the priest. "The Philosopher's Stone! There is only one way you could possibly ignore the law of equivalent exchange, and that's with that stone!" Edward yelled, looking a bit desperate, at least in Riku's opinion.

"Oh you mean this?" The priest held up his left hand, showing a ring with a large red stone built into it. Riku recognized a look of wanting and obsession cross over Edward's face,

"Yes, that's it, now give it or we'll have to do this the hard way." The thought was entertaining in itself, seeing Edward fight would be entertaining but as the conversation was about to carry itself, Riku heard the familiar click of a gun and one of the shots was against the back of his head. Edward seemed to hear these clicks as well as the Elric turned around furiously, not expecting back up. Riku sighed and looked over at Sora's shadow, for some strange reason, he knew he had power over only Sora's shadow. Riku had been testing out the shadow powers yesterday night and he found that he could form Sora's form out from his shadow, but only Sora's. Riku thought it may have been because Sora had the keyblade, he couldn't have all throughout protection, there had to be something that could betray him, and that would be his shadow, or at least that's what Riku thought. That strength, Sora's weakness would come very handy right...about...

"NOW!" Riku yelled, hoping that Edward had the intent on running somewhere as he did as Sora's shadow formed in a true physical sense and flouted in the air, blocking one shot to his other self and the other shot to the back of Riku's head with the anti-keyblade. The men grew afraid as the Anti-Sora seemed to grin with the very creepy yellow eyes. They started to fire at the heartless, ignoring the now running Riku (dragging Sora with him) behind a running pair of Elric brothers.

"And where do you think you're going? There's no way out!" Edward seemed to shrug and he clapped,

"Well one of my mottos is if there is no door," He then clapped to the wall ahead of them (of which Riku hadn't noticed, paying too much attention to the whining Sora) and an open doorway was created, "then make one." Edward grinned over his shoulder as the priest seemed abashed from this action. After recovering himself he yelled immediately,

"AFTER THEM!" Keh, good luck. Riku thought in his mind, it would take more then guns to even make a dent in the life-points of Sora's shadow, let alone the shadow wouldn't let them out of his sights. Riku wasn't too worried, heartless mainly only digest hearts that had gone way to corrupt, the really only time they went after innocent was if they really had no other heart nearby to devour. But that priest would surely get some attention, Riku smirked within his mind confidently. So they ran, Riku had no idea where they were running but didn't ask, rather actually feeling more lost then he had before. Oh crap, he had nearly forgotten about Kairi!

"This is where we split off, good luck." Riku said rather quickly, making sure Sora followed him. Edward threw him a look that Riku swear he didn't like but dealt with it as the two crossed away from a two path. Riku was positive that Edward wanted to inquire Riku about a certain heartless back fighting the gun-toting idiots but decided against it and continued to run. Riku was glad to find Kairi, still lying there in her coma state and picked her up. Sora was rubbing his human hand with his cheek, seeing as he didn't have anything else that showed flesh.

"Soraaa..." Sora complained, looking very confused at the same time. Riku sighed and moved over to Sora to explain the truth, the truth they had to get out of here...and probably fast.

"Here they are!" Riku sighed, it seemed that Anti-Sora had returned to the darkness from where it came from. Riku slowly turned to the many minions of the priest and their guns, "Where did the Elrics go?" Riku shrugged,

"We split up half-way." The one that seemed to be the leader (Riku noted that it was the same guy that Edward had kicked Alphonse's helmet earlier, which was showing especially well with the red-bruise from his face) motioned most of the lackeys to run off and find the Elric brothers while he remained. "Is something wrong?"

"There's something not right about you." The man replied back, rather bluntly on which Riku didn't resist the urge to give a death-defying glare.

"Oh? And what is that?" Riku asked, he could feel the back of his hair brushing up just a little in reaction to his anger, small heartless starting to build around the ill-lighted room. Sora frowned at this, and stared at Riku, unsure of what to do at all. The heartless started to crawl around carefully and silently, Riku felt weird as he took small delight in the fact he knew the man in front of him would be gone soon.

"Riku..." But the heartless were drawn away as Riku felt his heart clench tightly in a strange way as Sora begged Riku to stop in his own way. Information seemed to walk into Sora's mind that one moment, Riku had control over the heartless...what the heartless were and how Riku had control over them, Sora didn't know, he just knew it had to be bad. He knew he had to make Riku stop somehow. Riku looked over at Sora slightly, frowning as the man came closer, yes, Anti-Sora was back where it belonged, as Sora's shadow, watching carefully and golden eyes twitching at the thought of another battle.

"We caught them!" One of the many priests came by, a grin upon his face as their threatened had stopped his rampage.

"Good news! Tell Priest Cornello!" The man grinned and left the room to see this capture in his own eyes. Sora gave out an apparent sigh, very happy that they had been so lucky.

"Sora, let's go." Riku said to him, as though a slight tone of demanding but Sora could tell that Riku had just wanted to escape this place...but for what reason? And couldn't he say good-bye to Rose first? Good-bye...good-bye...what did that mean again?

"Goo...good...bye...?" Sora asked first, hoping that Riku would explain it to him, and was extremely grateful when Riku turned to him to tell him,

"Yes Sora, good-bye. It's usually said to someone else when they're going somewhere."

"Rose...good...bye...?" Sora asked, his eyes knotted in slight depression, especially when Riku nodded.

"Yes, but we need to get out of here Sora, there's darkness here that will corrupt the town soon, besides, I don't think I'm welcomed." Sora seemed saddened by this, but nodded slowly as though understanding clearly, so then followed Riku quietly down the halls, avoiding the faithful men of the temple. When they had reached outside, Sora found it strange to see that one of the statues were gone from its point of origin. The trio (one carried) continued to walk through the town, it was an amazing beautiful blue color at night and Sora found himself staring up to the many worlds...Worlds? Another strange piece of his mind that he had forgotten, what were those sparkling lights in the night sky? What was another world? Very...st...wait a minute. Sora tore his gaze from the strange blue sky and stared very blankly as Alphonse tried to creep around, well as well as a big suit of armor could creep around. Sora tugged on Riku's sleeve, pointing in the direction Alphonse was. Riku seemed to pause at this and follow Sora's finger and seemed disconcerned until Sora decided to take matters in his own hands and walk after Alphonse. Sora heard the loud groan from Riku's mouth and the slight light footsteps to signify that Riku was following him. Wasn't Alphonse and Edward captured (whatever that meant, Sora thought)? What was Alphonse doing now?

"Al!" Sora decided to voice out, seeing how Alphonse didn't seem to notice them at all. The large set of armor jumped up as though very surprised and his long white string followed his jump,

"Ah! Oh...Sora?" Alphonse said carefully, his voice very quiet. Sora got the idea and lowered his voice as well, dunking down deeper into the dark streets of Loire,

"Sora." Sora replied simply, looking at Alphonse in a rather confused way.

"Where's Edward?" Riku asked, voicing in Sora's question, looking around rather dully, as though to keep an eye out.

"He was captured, but he has a plan, as usual." Alphonse seemed to voice with a little annoyance.

"Oh?"

"Yes...but I have to help him prepare for it, please excuse me." Sora looked torn apart as Alphonse started moving away to help his brother. Sora looked at Riku and back at Alphonse's moving figure and back to Riku many times. Riku sighed, recognizing that very sad look and grunted not too eagerly,

"Hey, do you need any help?" And those words it was set off. Riku was stunned to find out that Edward got caught intentionally to show the town of the priest's intentions. A few hours later, Riku, Sora, Alphonse, a still very sleeping Kairi, and a saved Rose were all on top of the rather large temple and Cornello was confessing his deadly deed unknowingly as he talked to Edward, down in a small dungeon that he had made within the temple. Riku had covered his mouth as he watched all the stunned faces, hearing the proclaimed confession from Cornello and Edward showing him what he had done. Cornello tried to convince the not-so-easily-swayed crowd that it was a trick as he ran out to the overbearing masses. A short fight broke out between Edward and the priest and Riku was aware of the temple moving around a little as statues moved out from their built in place and many people started to have a religious conversation. Riku wasn't really sure of what the point of the argument was, but whatever the reason, Edward seemed to disagree with the crowd and clapped his hands and crowds screamed as an even larger statue crawled out from the inner most chambers of the temple and burst out.

"Not even the Philosopher's stone can bring something that big to life!"

"You see Rose, my brother has worked to be the way he is, we aren't anything really special, we don't get our power from fancy watches or anything else from that matter. My brother has the power because he's worked for it." Rose seemed to nod quietly at this, though she looked very sad about this.

"AUGH!" Came the anguished yell from the priest as he was attacked to the side by the large statue of the Sun God Leto. Edward missed him purposely, Riku frowned in dislike,

"Now, are you going to hand over the stone, or not?" The priest recoiled, holding over his hand and screaming back in anger,

"No! Never!" There were even more anguished screams and cries of surprise as the priest's hand burst out weirdly, Riku couldn't exactly recognize what happened to the priest's entire arm but it still wasn't any good as their was a strange piercing sound within the air.

"...All this time...all of this damn trouble...and it was a fake?"

"Niisan..." Alphonse said softly from the rooftop and Edward just looked up, a very angry look upon his face as he yelled loudly,

"GIVE ME A BREAK!" And he happened to kick the priest to relieve some of the stress of what had happened. Alphonse sighed and Riku couldn't help but frown as Sora seemed to also think this was a bad thing.

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"Why did you even come here?" The four stopped for a few seconds, looking back to the harshly breathing Rose, "The people were happy. Cornello gave us hope, how could you do this to us? He gave this town life!" Rose's body trembled, tears pouring down her face, "Why? What am I going to do now? The only thing that kept me going was the hope that I would hear his voice again! What can I do now Edward? WHAT?" Rose demanded, hoping to get an answer from Edward, "And...why are you leaving?" She directed this question towards Riku, who just shrugged her question off easily.

"Whatever you choose to do, at least you have a pair of two strong legs that can carry you there." Edward simply said, then moved on foreword, Riku followed him as the two had agreed silently that they would follow each other until they reached a better choice of civilization. Alphonse and Sora stood behind for a few seconds though, staring at the rather blank Rose.

"Rose...I need to tell you, I need to tell you so you don't make the same mistake we did..." Rose broke away, tears pouring from her eyes fiercely, "Alchemy is not magic, it is a science, and because it is science it has to follow the laws of nature." Rose started to shake, continuing to cry and then she ran off. Sora looked after her, feeling rather sore but then looked back to Alphonse. The armor seemed to smile at him privately and they walked to follow the older ones, who had everything in their hands.

Really...there was nothing else to do...

* * *

I screamed myself to death during the writing of this fanfic. I kept saying, that's nothing like what Riku would do, or what Edward would do! I'm so sorry my fellow readers as I have torn off the easily delicate table of canon and character of our beautiful characters! I shall commit seppuku very soon in honor for everyone who has actually taken the time to read this! I know it had to be quite repetitive, especially since if you seen the FMA episodes. You must think it'll be like the entire series, well...yes and no. Since Riku and Sora is there, they'll actually interfere somehow with the story-line, and yes, Kairi will wake up sooner or later, more later then sooner but she will. I know I had many things to answer if there were any questions, at least for me, but now it's all gone...so if there are any questions, please, ask them, I will try my best ability to answer them all. So...erno...that was chapter one, I hope you enjoyed it and I hope I didn't bore you. Also, this might be the longest chapter you will see in this fanfic, I'm truly and deeply sorry. I'm trying to do character development, but I...I suck at it, don't I? So please forgive me! So I hope you enjoyed it and if you wish to, please review and ask questions! Also, I am honestly sorry to make Sora so…well…the way I made him. I didn't mean to make him seem so weak, especially with the lack of anything he can say, it must have been annoying to read Sora speak his name over and over again, again, I am completely sorry.

Chapter: 13,389 words.


	2. II

Oh...wow...I feel like I've accomplished something great by the way you all commented on my meager piece of a crossover. I am thoroughly proud of how I could have even entertained all of you well enough. I want to bow to you all respectfully and thank you on the bottom of my heart...except you Eriku; you're always too entertaining to bow down to. Hehehe. Anyway, we are skipping to episode 10 of FMA, because from what I understand the previous eight episodes are when Edward is twelve and Alphonse is eleven but in this episode I have reason to believe that Edward is fifteen because they get the hint about the Philosopher's Stone is in Xenotime from this episode. But I'm not quite sure about the truth, and if it isn't, please for Goodness sakes, forgive me for being stupid. Also I want to send a thank you to Eriku who helped me type this chapter out because I was waiting for the episode to come out, but I'm moving very soon, so I have to start writing right now...Oh yes, about the past episodes, they will have a deep significance, but not right away. It'll show up when Sora starts remembering important things and he will ask Al some questions that will seem personal but Al will be able to reveal some of the past and make Sora understand the even more frightening and terrible limitations of science. Also Mustang is referred to by Edward as "Taisa" as that is what the fandoms of FMA say often, they for some odd reason also say that he's referred to Colonel otherwise, they're not quite sure why, so I guess I'll just continue with that fandom fact! Go me! Ah also, I forgot to say in the last chapter but "Niisan" is what Alphonse calls Edward, because it means 'brother' and to me it adds more cuteness to Alphonse...though that might be just me, but oh well.

So once again!

I do not own Kingdom Hearts, nor do I own Full Metal Alchemist.

Also there is no real Kairi bashing in this fanfic, just what may seem like the character's thoughts, and you can't stop someone's opinion about someone. Though I will admit, I have something bad happening to her in the future, so her personal will go off a bit, but that will be when we reach that point.

The warnings that were in the first chapter still apply.

And again, we go!

**_Treaded Steps_  
II.**

If it had just been only he and Edward on that bumpy train ride, it would have been very deadly quiet...luckily there was a very curious Sora who looked like he was struggling not to get up and ravage throughout the whole train. Riku had to admit that he too was curious, having never been on a 'train' as the Elric brothers had called it, but he had much more self-control then the child-brained Sora. Riku almost smiled, but he kept his guard very quietly.

"Where are we headed?" Riku finally asked though, now realizing that he was stranded with the Elric brothers and whatever destination they were going. Edward seemed to frown at this and he turned his head away furiously while Alphonse looked a little more uncomfortable.

"We're headed towards Aquroya," Edward simply replied, as though that was supposed to make perfect sense. For once, Riku wished he was in Sora's position, that way he wouldn't look so odd if he asked what kind of city Aquroya was. Luckily, or unluckily, depending on how you saw the situation, Alphonse seemed to recognize the unfamiliarity in Riku's face,

"It's the City of Water capital. It's a large city built on an island that is more likely to sink to the bottom very soon." Riku nodded, accepting that easily, so that's where they were headed...

"Is that where you think the Philosopher's Stone is?" Riku asked though, as he couldn't help out his curiosity. Riku blinked very slowly as he saw a twitch at the hand from Edward, and his eyes narrowing as though he was being taunted. Alphonse looked over at his brother with an armed (pun not intended) nervous look and Edward seemed to blow up, holding his head angrily with his temper tantrum voice,

"There's no way in hell I'm going back to _him_! He'll probably say "Oh so you've returned half-pint, let's see, destroyed half of the city and a false lead of the stone, great job, midget!" He's evil! He's pure evil!" Riku watched Edward, amused slightly as the boy overreacted about a certain someone. Although Riku did not know this man, he had a feeling that he had to be something good to get Edward riled up so easily.

"Eee...veil?" Sora tried to copy Edward's stature and the blonde stared at him for a second before giving up and collapsing back in the seat. People stared over at their cushioned seats for awhile, terrified to defend themselves at any given moment.

"Niisan, you shouldn't say that about Colonel Mustang." Mustang? Was this man some kind of horse-fella? Riku wouldn't be surprised, with all that strange stuff he had seen in just a span of a few days, he really wouldn't be surprised...

"Mustang?" Riku voiced his question, as he couldn't help his curiosity for this moment. Sora also seemed to be nodding to try and find out more about the man who upset Edward in such a way.

"Colonal Mustang, he's the one who commands over Edward's missions, basically Edward's boss." Alphonse tried to say lightly but from the angry twitch from his older brother, Edward did not approve of these words. Riku frowned inwardly as Edward started an argument with Alphonse, missions? Boss? Ranks of a war-bringer? Riku recalled sitting in his father's lap with Sora sitting by the side as they had listened carefully to a story his father told. A story of worlds at war, that there were ranks that commanded over others easily and the highest rank got to control whatever they wished, stories of treachery, pain, and the mind-filled angst of a solider killing their first innocent person. Riku's eyes narrowed darkly, was this a world of war? A terrible thought, and if that was true, Riku would have to move out of the world as fast as humanly possible, but who knew if that could be possible or not...Riku didn't like where this was going, no, he didn't like it at all.

"...Wa...waaa...ter...Water." Sora spoke slowly, drawing Riku's focus away from his thoughts as the train started to slowly come to a stop and was amazed to see the familiar glint of a sea outside the windows. As the train came to a complete stop, he started to pick up Kairi from her seat from the side but Alphonse beat him to it and although Riku started with a protective glare but his glare was slowly let off as Alphonse apologized,

"I just thought that she may have been a bit heavy for you...I didn't want you to carry her if it would difficult...I'm sorry." Riku stared blankly at the large full-plate and just nodded slowly, accepting his help, very cautiously as the heartless jumped at the thought of good will. A small smile even spread to his face as Sora grabbed his hand fiercely as they started to step out from the train. It was soon when Riku grew grumpy with Edward as they both realized they were going to have to walk a few extra miles in water-based land because the train could not travel any closer to the large island based land.

--------------------------------

"I SWEAR TO ALL THE HOLY FORCES IN THE SKIES THAT I WILL **KILL** WHOEVER MADE THESE ROADS!" Riku covered his mouth to cover the smile that was going to consume his face very soon. Edward was so hilarious, yes they had been drenched in water from traveling the shoddy roads that attempted to lead them to their destination. The only reason Edward was complaining so much was because he was drenched all the way to his neck-line, and because everyone was taller then him, they didn't get quite as wet walking through the lands.

"At least we're here now Niisan." Alphonse politely put in, and Riku could feel a cheerful optimistic smile coming from the piece of armor if there were a body still in it.

"Yeah, yeah," Edward didn't seem any less discouraged from his grumpy mood from these kind words, but Alphonse also didn't seem to be put off so Riku took it as though it was a brother thing. Though he wouldn't know, nobody on Destiny Island had any siblings...well except _maybe_ Selphie, but she never said anything about her private life, so nobody really thought about it.

"Pretty." Riku looked back a bit at Sora who seemed bent on playing with the draining water, splashing his legs and bending foreword to play with his hands, it was a good thing they weren't in their normal clothes, Sora had a curse on those things Riku swore. Every time the boy would go playing in the beach with the water he would get a terrible cold, of course the damage of the cold wore off as time went on, but it was still annoying when Sora had a sniffle in his speak. Another part of Sora that had not changed, his love for water. But still, he would have to get Sora out of those clothes as soon as possible if the boy were to catch a cold, it would hinder their traveling.

"Come on Sora, we're almost to land." Sora looked up at Riku with a glowing blue eye, though the bandage that covered his right eye was drenched and almost showed a scar on Sora's skin...but it wasn't that leaked but Riku could tell that it was still in bad shape, he would also have to change the bandage otherwise it would get infected, especially with this kind of water around, who _knows_ what someone could have done in it? Sora stared at Riku with a sad look but nodded slowly as he saw Alphonse and Edward had continued walking. Riku couldn't help but stare at the very wet Sora for a bit, as the boy seemed to be concentrating on something, that look was just cute in the most strangest ways. Perhaps because Riku hadn't seen Sora concentrate in a thought pattern, just in sparring, and even then Sora was a bit thick in the head,

"Kai..." Riku grew a bit surprised as Sora started to speak the syllables for their dear 'little sister', his heart actually grew a bit in hope, "Rei?" Riku didn't know how to describe it...but he had actually _fell_ into the water, his entire body flying up and his legs in the air. Riku then took a few moments to try and compose in his mind on what the _hell_ had just happened, and he was now completely drenched because of the strange fall. Riku then glared up to Sora who had pointed at him and started laughing...strange kind of laughter though, Riku noted. Or perhaps it was because he hadn't heard the brunette laugh for a long time, and the boy seemed to remember what laughing was...that made Riku feel extremely warm on the inside. Riku soon followed in laughter, standing up slowly as his white shirt clinged to him in a sticky mess, and patted Sora on the head carefully,

"Close...very close..." Riku muttered from his lips, a strange smile edging on his face.

"Hey you two! Keep up!" Edward yelled back to them, swinging his automail arm, which reminded Riku of the early worries he held for the brunette earlier, now added with the creaky limbs of automail, from what Riku could know about metal, it would probably rust if he didn't give it a good rub-down. Riku turned back to Edward,

"Alright, we're coming!" Riku grabbed Sora's warm, yet very wet flesh right hand and encouraged Sora to move with him, of which the brunette seemed to pout but they moved faster to catch up to the Elric brothers. It was very soon, drenched in water, that they stared up at the large city full of buildings and it was growing dark.

"Wow!" Sora was the first to say, though Riku was a bit surprised as much as Sora, thinking of how it was possible for such large buildings to even stand on this type of island, it was as though the buildings were all crowding at the edges of the island...Riku didn't think it was very possible, but here it was, living proof of the fact he was wrong. The darkening sun started to close in and as they were about to continue their journey...Edward was pushed away harshly into Riku, making both of them fall from the action as Alphonse and Sora stared after the person who had passed them.

"WHAT THE HELL?" Edward got up immediately, appearing very angry as it was a woman that had pushed them both down. The woman laughed charmingly and waved off,

"Sorry about that!" The woman was dressed in a strange black-grayish tight leather and she had a strange hat on her head, covering with a white mask. Riku numbly got up, feeling more sticky for some strange reason and there was a stunned silence as there was the echoing sound of several footsteps echoing throughout the streets. The older boys slowly turned their heads and couldn't help but yell in a panic as a group of policemen and a man carrying handcuffs in the air charged out after the woman. Screams overtook the city as Edward and Riku were run over by the yelling officers, nevermind that Riku could actually think that someone could not see him in the way, but to completely run him over? There was something very drastic about this world that was not at all right! ((A/N: Importing anime is fun XD)) It must have either been the pain in Riku's lower back, or the pain of slowly realizing that he was melding into the strange physics of this world, but it took Riku quite a few minutes for him to even attempt getting up. The stunned faces of Alphonse and Sora were also not helping.

"Niisan..." Alphonse started but the evil glare emitting from Edward's golden eyes made Alphonse stop his sentence completely. A few more minutes of angered silence surrounded the two when Sora held out his left arm to Riku, looking semi-concerned. Riku gave a loud sigh and took his hand and climbed up, staring down at the angry Edward.

"Hey, we have to get to shelter, unless of course you plan on getting phenomena." Riku said with a slight sneer, recalling the terrible time when Sora had first got that evil disease. Edward sighed a bit, getting up and cracking his back, which made even Alphonse wince as the older Elric stretched a bit,

"Good point, though I don't see what you two are going to change into, you brought no luggage."

"Neither did you." Riku countered, his eyes narrowing angrily. Edward just shrugged and started to walk foreword, intent on finding them a place to stay.

"I wonder what that was about though..." Edward mused, looking up to the growing path of Worlds in the sky, Riku followed the blonde's gaze, hoping almost loudly that he would get off of this World soon...

"Achoo!" Riku froze as the terrible omen of a cold came from directly Sora's mouth. Riku slowly turned, as though afraid to confirm his thoughts, he even had very small, _small_ hopes that it had actually been Alphonse but probably like the heartless, Alphonse did not get colds. And so with a slow twitching of the face, he stared carefully at Sora, who was now holding himself with a whimper. Oh God, WHY? "Cooo...ld..." Sora whimpered, actually looking like a lost puppy.

"Oh Sora..." Riku moaned loudly, hitting himself on the head, blaming himself as the boy started to shiver pathetically as the shirt clinged to him, not embracing any warmth for comfort. Edward stared at Sora with a slightly sad look and grabbed the boy, starting to lead him off, now even more determined to find a resting-place. Riku and Alphonse followed after, having to dash at a very fast speed to reach behind Edward. "Oye, Edward! Don't run so fast!" Riku demanded, trying to follow after the quick and equally fast moving teenagers ahead of him. Edward just looked back and grinned as they came to a sudden stop in front of a large inn,

"This should do." Edward commented, leading Sora in easily as his brother and caretaker of Sora walked in, Riku looking a bit exhausted. It was probably because he was the only member that was walking that had two basic human legs. Edward just grinned as he got a room for the four, not the cheapest but with a big city, Edward had expected it. When they had reached their room Edward grinned at Alphonse as he placed the girl on a separate bed to sleep on. Riku groaned miserably and sat on Kairi's bed, took off his shirt and wringed it tight on the carpet floor (gaining a protest from Edward) and looked over at Sora, doing a teaching look and wringing out more of his shirt. Sora just stared at him blankly as Edward sighed a bit angrily. Alphonse seemed to grin and snapped his clasps for the front of his armor-piece and Riku stared blankly as Alphonse drew out a trunk.

"I see..." Riku glared at Edward, kindly not taking it lightly, as Edward could have said something earlier.

"Come on Sora, let's get you out of those rags." Edward grinned at the confused brunette, holding up one of his black tang-tops for the sticky boy. Sora stared blankly for a second then passed Edward, pulling out one of Edward's coat, grinning cheerfully and holding it up. "No way! My coat is off limits!" Edward started to chase Sora around the room as the boy was running around with the hoodie attached to his head.

"It's not like it would fit him." Riku muttered and was surprised as Sora and Edward stopped for a second, and Edward faced Riku with a very twitchy face. Riku rose an eyebrow...and yelled as the blonde attacked him, he was even more surprised when Sora joined in cheerfully, the three boys rolling around in a wrestle-maniac and Sora was winning badly. Alphonse just stared, looking desperately like he wanted to stop the mess that Edward had created when Sora rose as victor with a strange work of his human hand, a large 'V'.

"I give, I give!" Edward moaned, as Sora had comfortably settled on Riku and Edward's backs. Alphonse just sighed as Sora made no motion of moving from his winning stance. Riku took that short moment to think about the two who had let them accompany them, there were still very strange things about them but Riku would have to guess they weren't that bad. In the meanwhile, who knew that Sora could beat him so easily with such crappy automail? It almost made Riku feel ashamed of his skills as a fighter, but it was very pleasing that Sora could know enough self-defense if he ever needed it.

"Sora, Sora!" Sora stood up finally, giving relief to the two older ones, hugging his new red coat that he refused to let go of. After a few moments of settling down, Riku had managed to force Sora into Edward's black tang-top that the blonde had offered earlier and make the coat cover the boy comfortably, now trying to clean Sora's automail for the sake of the worry he held earlier. Riku noticed Edward and Alphonse watching him,

"What?"

"Are you an automail engineer? You seem to know how to handle such crafty pieces." Edward asked, somehow a smirk built its way on his face. Riku rose a skeptic eyebrow,

"Crafty is hardly the word..." Riku looked back down at Sora's automail arm, cleaning its surface carefully, "No, I don't know anything about the mechanics of automail..." His father had been a mercenary, had done many jobs and knew many things, most of which Riku used to think were fairy tales. It was kind of funny how Riku could remember it all now, and he felt extremely lucky to have had such a father as his..."Why?"

"It's just you remind me of a friend of ours, she likes cleaning my automail like that whenever she gets the chance." Hm, nice to know that no matter the type of iron or steel, it would go through the same cleaning process. Riku then sighed,

"Did your friend also make your automail?" Edward nodded carefully, though it seemed to be slightly guarded, noticing the tone of voice Riku started using. "Do you think she would make some automail for Sora? I may not know much about automail, but even I can tell these could be a lot better." Riku simply said, going back to his previous mission and cleaning Sora's automail.

"Who knows?" Edward shrugged, not looking like he really cared. Riku stared at the suggested pose, recognizing the tensed position but didn't say anything about it, grinning as he finally finished his job. Sora stood up and stretched and frowned a bit, the Elric brothers and Riku watched as he went out of the room, they waited for the brunette for five minutes. Riku tensed up, frowning darkly as he stood to follow after the path of the brunette, the Elric brothers right behind him. Almost immediately there were cries of pain, yells of panic surrounded the inn. Riku growled, forcing the heartless to sense the trouble around, had they really traveled so fast? The heartless were known for being tenacious but this was ridiculous! It must have been the heartless in Sora's shadow, pulling and taunting the heartless to come absorb the pure heart of Sora. Riku's heart tightened as the screams stopped, and a body flew in front of their vision, the caretaker's face blank as the body disappeared into a flouting glowing heart. Riku did not stay to see the heart become a shadow, but continued in a faster pace, expecting to see the worse.

"SORA!" Riku yelled, demanding to hear the boy's voice and he was glad to see the boy. But...something was wrong, Sora was staring down. Riku followed his blue eye's gaze and fear tightened in his heart. A little girl was lying on the ground, gashes dug into the girls side but the biggest wound was in the shape of a very blunt object...And no heartless had the power of a blunt object to bash anyone, besides they preferred to torture their victims with sharp gashes that appeared physical but was actually always targeted at their heart...but that blow. "Sora?" Sora looked up to Riku, startled and he held out the Three Wishes,

"Riku...death..." Sora dropped the keyblade, it disappeared immediately as Sora dropped to the ground after it, "I DIDN'T DO IT!" Riku stared, wildly surprised as Sora screamed out a comprehendible sentence.

"What the hell are these things?" Edward came running with Alphonse right behind him, shadow heartless trailing after them. Riku growled, knowing he didn't have any time to deal with this, imitating the stance Edward had held earlier when he first saw Alchemy, he clapped his hands and pulled his wicked blade from the ground, shocked to find the alchemic lightning flashing around him as he easily ran through and destroyed the shadow heartless.

"Sora, are you alright?" Alphonse asked, bending down to the terrified brunette while Edward summoned up his blade to help fight Riku fight the heartless around.

"I didn't do it..." Sora yelled again, holding his head tightly as he curled himself into a little ball. Edward growled, backing up to Riku until they covered each other's backs,

"Why the hell aren't I hitting these things?"

"How should I know?" Riku yelled back, blocking as one the shadow flung to him, very strange...he couldn't quite grip control over these heartless, probably because they were heartless made of this new world. But surely they had a strong weakness...The two fighting looked up as the lights of the inn started to dim and Riku heard the loud sound of Sora's gasp, instantly during the darkness, Riku summoned a fireball right at the edge of his blade, and shot it directly at the shadow heartless easily from the light of the fire. Riku smirked confidently as the familiar glow of the light pink and purple disappeared into the air, he then held up his blade, preparing a multi cast of fireballs when for a strange instant, the battle stopped. It grew deadly quiet as the lights flashed back on in full force and there were no signs of the heartless, the only sign of a struggle was the strange rolling glass bottles around the tile floors. Edward and Riku kept up their guard, glaring around while trying to check up on the others. Riku sighed as it seemed Sora somehow managed to fall asleep during the strange battle...must be a strange strain on Sora's (now) short mind.

"Put your hands where we can see them, now!" Riku and Edward's gazes immediately went defensive but flinched as it was the detective and his shogun of police from earlier. After sparing a few glances at each other, both sighed and held their hands up high, waiting for the consequences of their self-defense.

--------------------------------

So that was how they got into their current situation in this cell, Riku thought blankly as he adjusted the two sleeping persons on his shoulders. In retrospect, fighting the heartless in that inn was definitely not the smartest thing to do...and Sora was probably still getting a cold, especially now when they were buried in a cold dank and dark prison...at least they didn't have anyone else in there with them. Riku looked up to Edward, a dull look upon his face,

"Are you ever going to stop that...dancing?" In actuality, it was Edward complaining a bit to let out, something about a State Alchemist within the rant, but Riku didn't care enough to listen. Edward faced back at him and sighed, rubbing the back of his head,

"They didn't even give us a questioning! What kind of crappy police-force is this?" Riku shrugged at the question, not being able to answer it either, in fact, before they ever started on this crazy adventure, he wasn't aware there was a force called 'pole-lease'. Now that Riku had thought about it even more, why didn't Edward just clap his hands and transmute the bars into something else? These police must be some power to reckon with.

"Achoo!" Sora sneezed for a second in his sleep and turned a bit to nudge Riku's side, which made Riku a little off balance and made Kairi accidentally hit the cold bench he was sitting on. Kairi's body had actually reacted to that with a loud hiss, but remained incoherent otherwise. Riku sighed in an aggravated state as Sora stood up, looking around while rubbing his eyes. It took the brunette a few more minutes to realize that they weren't at the inn and he panicked, though Riku had to admit, it was amusing to see Sora hug at Alphonse's waist, crying out 'Niisan' as Alphonse was also now at a worrisome state. Riku continued to stare as a sound of a certain metal door opening came to his senses and the detective that had earlier arrested and ran he and Edward earlier came in, looking very well ashamed.

"I am very sorry, sir alchemist, I had no idea you were the Full Metal Alchemist, please forgive us. But we have had our hands full lately." The detective stepped out of the way and Edward shoved his way through as Alphonse kindly took Kairi and Riku helped Sora move. They were dragged off into a room, with very dim lights, a small table, and very uncomfortable chairs. "I am sorry, really. It's just that the circumstances were against you." Riku kept his mouth shut, and decided firmly to let Edward handle it, the blonde-haired boy already seemed to look foreword to talking, so Riku would let him.

"Yeah, but you didn't even let us in for a questioning, that's just a crappy excuse." Sora sneezed at this moment, looking more miserable by the minute. The detective looked at him for a quick second with slight sympathy, seeing as how they were all just children (physically that is, mentally, he wasn't so sure). "By the way, which Headquarters did you call to confirm that I was a part of the state?" Edward said casually, though slipping a bit in his tone that he may be worried about the answer.

"Well I tried Central first, but they transferred me to the East, made me talk to your superior, a one Colonel Roy Mustang." Riku was fascinated by the twitch in Edward's eyes as the detective continued, "He confirmed that you were a part of the state, and has orders for you to help us capture our thief, Psiren." There were a few moments of silence and of which Riku was well aware that Alphonse seemed to stare at his brother.

"He...did what?"

"Gave you orders to help us, and it's really the least you could do really, especially with the evidence and circumstances again-..." The detective was trailed off by his sentence as he looked up to see Edward's ultimate fury.

"He did this on purpose!" There was a stunned silence as Edward went into a terrible rant, most of it was somehow killing Mustang because of his evil 'I-know-all-ness'. The detective then sighed and faced over to Riku, simply starting back from where he had been interrupted.

"So, you are going to help us, right?"

"Don't look at me, I'm a civilian." Riku muttered back, shrugging in a slightly bored matter. The detective opened a mouth to put his thoughts in about this when a very loud and uncomfortable,

"ACHOO!" The occupants of the room paused as Sora rubbed his nose irritably with red eyes and looked terribly tired. "Cooollld..." Sora moaned, and leaned against Alphonse as though this was a comforting motion.

"Uhh...is this kid okay?"

"I would think not. You kept him in a cold cell and he hasn't been able to rest at all since we've got here." Riku scorned, finding himself becoming extremely angry for some strange odd reason, but his anger was somehow overwhelmed with distress, "Can't you get him to a hospital?"

"It's not that bad is it?" The detective laughed and held out his hand as though to pat Sora's head, but surprisingly, he got bit instead. The detective yelped as Riku thoughtfully said that,

"He hasn't had anything to eat either." A few minutes later, they were all sitting down, all eating food (excluding Alphonse who offered his food to Sora, who eagerly took it) and staring up to the sore detective.

"So what's this about a thief?"

"Ah yes...Miss Psiren has eluded us for the past couple of...months." Riku coughed and hid a smile as Edward muttered a 'Not surprised' as they continued to eat contently.

"So why have you been having so much trouble capturing this...Psiren?" Edward asked, stopping from his outrageous metabolism for that moment. Riku was rather surprised by how much the older Elric brother could eat, of course that surprise was only surpassed by the fact they were using a foreign tool to eat this strange food.

"We're not sure, she's just always slipping out of our grasp." Riku had to bite back another smile, as Edward scoffed angrily. Edward then just sighed as Sora sneezed once again, rubbing his nose miserably.

"Do you know where she's going to strike next?" Alphonse helpfully asked with a hopeful tone in his voice, snatching Sora's chopsticks as he had started to chew on them. The detective squirmed as Alphonse said this, which made the older two glare suspiciously. And if you were prone to be under the glares of one Edward Elric and Riku, you would be as nervous the detective was at that instant.

"Actually, yes, we know exactly where and when she's going to strike."

"Then what do you need our help for?" Riku and Edward both yelled, looking as angry as their tones had suggested. The detective flinched from their gazes, amazing how two boys whose bodies obviously said child could instill fear to run down his spine. The detective then nodded casually,

"We're not sure why, but she just...escapes us! It's like she's using magic or something against us!" At the word magic, Edward and Riku looked over at each other with exactly one thought: Alchemy. Even though Riku had done alchemy only once, he could understand that this world's use of 'magic' was through the use of alchemy. Poor fools, no wonder why they couldn't capture this 'elusive thief'.

"Right, well just give us the time and place, and we'll be there." Edward then finally commented, seeing as there was no way out of this in the first place, especially with an order from his 'superior'. Riku smiled almost sympathetically for Edward, but had no real reason to really care, for all he knew, Edward was probably used to stuff like this happening. The detective nodded and gave Edward the time and place, while also handing a map to the short blonde and the four stood up and walked out of the station. Riku frowned though as they slowly started to leave, his stomach started to feel very strange...like a terrible cramp was starting at the edge but slowly working its way up. There were two loud THUNKS to the ground as Edward started to complain loudly and Sora just moaned in straight pain.

"Niisan!" Alphonse panicked especially as Riku also finally fell, the strength of pain in his stomach was overwhelming! Riku had sordidly placed in his mind _never_ to eat foreign food for a _long_ time.

--------------------------------

Riku had found himself awoken in a very strange place with a strange ceiling made of tile. Riku couldn't help but fear standing back up, afraid of maybe his stomach collapsing on him again, he hadn't even eaten that much! But Sora had...oh that poor boy, Riku knew he could take the pain but Sora? Riku's vision was replaced with a woman with blonde hair and enchanting blue eyes who touched his forehead.

"Ah, you seemed to have made a full recovery." The blonde smiled cheerfully and Riku stood up at those words, feeling _much_ better. Riku then looked up to the blonde, narrowing his eyes as he read a nametag that was labeled 'Clara'.

"Where are-?"

"Oh, the other two who had food poisoning as well? They're resting in a different room, they had a severe case." Clara sighed simply at what Riku could describe at tsking. Riku wasn't surprised but at least he knew it wasn't a common thing, and nothing life threatening either.

"May I see them?" Riku asked carefully, his gaze switching around to the small room he was in, carefully seeing if anything was wrong.

"Sure. Not sure if they'll be awake or not, but no reason you can't see them." Riku was annoyed by the blonde's attitude, it was...perky. But whatever, she had helped him get over the evil case of food poisoning and he would withstand such a stupid disposition for awhile. Riku followed her as she led the way to Sora and Edward, as they entered the room, Riku was pleased to see Alphonse in there as well, right by his brother's bed-side.

"They really shouldn't have ate so much," Riku noted outloud as he looked over to Sora whose face was in absolute misery. Riku was thankful he didn't have a high metabolism rate as it seemed to have saved him from the torture of cramps.

"Riiikuuu." Sora moaned, peering one eye open and Riku sighed as a reply as Sora held up his human hand and tried to make a grab at the boy. Riku was displeased to think it might have been in blame for the older one, but oh well. He let the poor boy grab at his shirt and watched as the boy relentlessly tugged it, as though it was going to stop the pain. Riku couldn't help but give Sora a sore smile and patted the boy's head, it was then he noticed that Sora's bandage had been taken off. It was an ugly, furious burn mark, spread from his forehead to the edge of his blue eye. Even his blue eye seemed to be burned almost shut with a taunting itchy look to it. Riku felt immediate guilt as Sora kept tugging at his long sleeve, this must have tortured the boy far worse then his own limbs.

"Lousy Aquroya food." Edward moaned and Riku ignored him, grabbing at a gauze and another bandage that was very helpfully in the room and started to wrap it around Sora's head carefully.

"It wasn't so bad, was it?" Alphonse asked and Riku took a frustrated bite to his lips as he was failing in wrapping Sora's bandage. Rose had made this look a lot easier then it really was.

"I guess it could be worse." Edward finally realized and looked over at the two that were accompanying them. Edward stared long and hard, he had the whole night of pain to think, and he was very curious about Riku as of right now. The boy had performed alchemy without using an array, and even made a flame! And he had done it very easily. There was something that made the two far stranger then Edward had given them credit for, and eventually, he would delve into their minds to find out, but for now...

"So you all seem to have made a full recovery." Clara had walked into the room, checking on their temperatures with her hand with a clear smile. Sora pouted as Clara checked him though, as though he was thinking of something serious and was interrupted by the blonde's entrance.

"Yeah, thanks for the care." Edward interrupted though as Sora opened his mouth as though to complain and surprised the nurse and his accomplice's by getting up with ease, while stretching his flesh arm. "So what's the bill?" Clara smiled simply and produced a slip of paper and Edward stared at it very calmly...then he twitched dangerously. Riku was almost fascinated by the ugly grimace on Edward's face, but was surprised as the boy grumbled and asked angrily for a pen, of which the nurse supplied and signed the bill. Well that was awfully nice of Edward to sign for their own expenses. Riku stood up and helped Sora up, and followed after Edward as the blonde boy left. Alphonse looked a little on helplessly before bowing politely to Clara and thanked her for the services.

"So are we going to back to that crappy detective?" Riku then realized the sentence that came out from his own mouth, he was starting to talk like Edward! That was very strange!

"Nah, we'll report to him later, he's more then likely going to be at that annoying thief's new target at night." Riku stared quietly then couldn't help but voice,

"Then what _are_ we going to do?" Edward grinned and patted Sora, who was currently playing with the hoodie that came with the coat,

"I'm very curious on Sora's memory loss, that and I have to research up on another subject, we're going to be going to the library in this overpopulated excuse for a city." Riku blinked, very slowly. What did the library have to do with Sora's memory? Then again, perhaps there were some books that focused on memory loss? Although Riku wasn't much of a fan of reading, he would read if it could do anything to help his current situation...like a way out of this world...

"I see." Riku simply replied as Edward took off with Sora, Sora laughing as though it was a game, which it probably was, oh how nice it would be to be as ignorant as Sora. Riku sighed slightly but stopped his complete course of action as Alphonse had settled to walking with him. A slow but sure pace. Alphonse was carrying Kairi once again and Riku frowned as Alphonse timidly asked,

"Riku, why hasn't your friend woken up? I haven't seen her awake...and I stayed up all night..." Alphonse's voice sounded as tired as Riku knew his body would be if he had the ability to stay up all night. Alphonse probably never fell asleep, like the heartless in the back of Riku's mind.

"...Human transmutation...it's the reason why you're stuck in that body, isn't it?" Alphonse seemed to be quieted from this sentence as both boys continued to follow after the sure path that Edward was leading them too.

"Yes." He finally replied back, and his cold tints of highlight in the armor stared back, "Did you...?"

"Yes." Riku lied easily, this would probably make the boy's stop trying to question on their position, especially if it had something to relate to something as treacherous as human transmutation. Although Riku didn't know what the magnitude of this simply brought, he knew that it would probably stop the conversation completely.

"Is that why Sora's...?" Alphonse trailed off even more, especially as some woman giggled to them and waved to the two very charmingly. Riku sighed, and looked away, that he wouldn't be able to lie about.

"I don't know, we were away from each other...for all I know, he could have just bumped his head very hard." Alphonse didn't speak about it anymore, perhaps it was the strange way Riku was looking down at the streets with a small smile. It was true, Riku didn't know the truth, and it felt very strange not to know it either, even though he had unlimited power at his fingertips, it still wasn't enough to bring him the answers that he wanted or needed. They finally made it to the library and Riku was a little surprised that the library wasn't extremely huge, probably enough room for a couple of children's books and some philosophical adult books, but still, Edward seemed relieved to wonder into the steps of the library and enter in the strangely smelled library. "So Edward, where do you plan on searching first?" Edward just smirked confidently back first and dragged Sora with him as the two went into darker shelves of the library. Riku sighed and just wondered around by himself, he didn't have a too good feeling of the library, perhaps there were heartless somewhere he could deal with quietly without causing a commotion.

Edward stared at the way Riku walked off and frowned lightly, he wasn't too sure of the silver-haired other, but he couldn't keep his eyes off of him permanently...but for now, Sora's own problem called to his scientific mind. There had been many people before in the past that had a supreme memory loss, but a complete and total case of forgotten memory like Sora's was very strange. The mere thought of speculating how he reacted to learning and even maybe remembering things from other situations taunted Edward's scientific mind. But as a human, he also was curious on finding answers from Sora while helping the brunette.

"Ed?" Sora asked, almost cutely as he poked at the many books on the shelves, fingering the spines as he took the steps through the halls. Sora stared at Edward for an answer, Edward just smiled back anxiously, also looking through the spines, only for titles and not for beauty purposes.

"Sora, try and find something labeled 'Memories: Scientific Theory'." Edward tried, hoping that maybe Sora could help him. Sora pouted and Edward just laughed back, he should have known better that reading would be just as hard for the brunette. That was really terrible though, Edward would hate it if he was in Sora's position, but luckily he was not. So instead, Edward joined Sora's side and smiled as he grabbed one of the books from the shelf to study. Sora stared at Edward with a curious look, bending his head down to look over the blonde's shoulder to try and understand the language in the book. Unfortunately the brunette could not distinguish one letter from another, therefore appearing a lot like a bunch of mumbo-jumbo. Sora grew frustrated at himself as it seemed Edward could read it very easily, especially with how the boy was turning the pages at a fast-pace.

"Ed..." Sora tried to voice in, but Edward ignored him for the moment, staring quietly at the many thesis of memory loss. Sora frowned and walked off by himself, looking around for something that he may have understood. The place had a creepy familiar feeling to it, but Sora didn't know how or why it seemed so very important. Sora cross paths deeper into the many halls and blinked as he saw a girl, looking at him with sad green eyes.

"Sora..." Sora couldn't help it, he ran to the pathway the woman was, as she walked off. Sora felt a little upset as he turned to find that she had disappeared, how very strange.

"Hey Sora, did Squall hit you too hard on the head again?" Sora moved his head to see who else knew his name, this time it was another girl, though she seemed far younger then the green-eyed woman from earlier. The girl winked at him and gave him a brilliant grin and walked off with a wave. Sora felt torn as he followed after her, the pathways growing so much darker.

"Kind of funny...the Keyblade chose you as it's wielder, but your heart is strong, isn't it, Sora?" This time it was a man's voice, and it was from another darker hallway, but he followed without questioning, wanting to know who these mysterious people were. Really...this was ridiculous!

"Don't worry, You'll find your light...as I will." A blonde...Why was _he_ familiar, Sora took another turn and stared helplessly as the four mysterious people stood there, in front of a door, the girls were smiling in a very strange way while the men looked away, as though they were embarrassed.

"...Why...?" Sora asked, as though the illusions would answer back, but he thought better. The illusions disappeared into a mystic air and Sora somehow felt incredibly sad. "Why?" Sora questioned the halls, staring up to the dark pathway that lead to the ceiling of the library, Sora trembled as though he felt like he was in pain. And he felt so deeply in pain, but then he shook his head, "I didn't...!" Sora then became alarmed as the door in front of him trembled in a roar and Sora felt frozen as the strange creepy yellow eyes opened up and the strange heartless started crawling closer and closer. Sora started to shake angrily, why were they attacking him? Why wouldn't they leave him alone, he did nothing to deserve this! ...Did he?

"Sora!" Sora moved to see his savior as Riku slashed his way through the heartless that had surrounded Sora, "Are you okay?" Well the truthful answer was he was definitely not, but he did not know how to put this in a normal form. So Sora just whined a little and clinged to Riku that one instant, not wanting to bring out the weapon of d e a t h...? Death? Riku slashed through the heartless fairly easily and Sora, although he was in a slight mind crisis, he couldn't help but stare in admiration as Riku's eyes glazed brightly against each slice he made in the air, and the heartless cooing down into the floors, disappearing completely as Riku placed his weapon away. Sora frowned and stared up at Riku sadly,

"Riku..." Sora then looked down, as though in shame and Riku stared back down in a little curiosity.

"Sora are you okay?" Riku asked, bending down just a bit to touch the top of Sora's forehead, Sora continued to frown, a new question arising in his mind.

"Death?" Riku froze at those words slightly, a careful look came across his face as he bent down a bit more to help Sora stand up straight, as he tried to explain what death meant to the amnesia boy.

"Death...when someone...or something," Riku tried to choose the words carefully, what had Sora's mother said to him? Sora's mind was very much like an infant's, no concept of the more terrible pangs of reality, so he would have to break it across to him carefully. Riku then wondered slightly if the girl in the inn was really dead or not. "When they stop...completely stop. They don't wake up, no matter what you do, death is a deep sleep." Riku tried, but saw Sora grip his right hand tightly and Riku sighed as he saw the frustrated look in his friend's blue eyes.

"Riku...Death?"

"Yes Sora...I...I can die too." Sora seemed alarmed by these words and Riku wasn't too surprised to find Sora cradling him, hugging him tightly as though that would stop the cold scythe of death. Riku looked away, trying his best not to think of the subject, after all, there was no way he was going to die now.

"Riku..." Riku sighed and separated from the hug that Sora had seemed to have so tightly on him, and gave Sora a firm look,

"I won't be dying soon though, okay? We're going to get out of here and then we'll find Kairi's heart..." What would they do after that though? Riku didn't know, but he really actually didn't care, Sora was going to stay on his side and everything would be okay as soon as Kairi woke up, right? Sora blinked into Riku's determined set of eyes, and he slowly nodded, as though being able to read the pattern in Riku's head. Sora was then amused to see Edward's face pop out, his braid swinging below him and Edward grinned at the sight of the two.

"There you are!" Edward continued grinning and walked to the two, and Riku couldn't feel inclined to be suspicious as Edward got closer.

"We were just looking for a book." Riku replied, turning to the blonde to stare directly into the golden iris, imitating the other's grin.

"I see." Riku recognized that suspicious tone, but said nothing against it as Edward folded his hands behind him and he looked over at Sora, actually giving a friendly grin and Riku couldn't help but feel just a little annoyed, "Did you find it?" Riku shook his head as Sora nodded. This made Riku slightly surprised as Sora walked into the room the heartless emerged from earlier and brought out a medium-sized book that said, "Alchemy for Beginners."

"Ed..." Sora seemed to ask, pushing the book slightly into Edward's hands, looking like he wanted someone to read it to him. Edward looked just as surprised as Riku and stared at the book, almost a gentle look appeared on his face.

"Maybe later Sora," Edward handed the book back and Sora seemed very saddened by this, "We need to capture that thief, remember?" Edward grinned at Sora and the boy grinned back, liking the sound of the sentence. Sora then skipped off, book in his hands, ignorant to the fact that it belonged to the library and Edward was about to move after when Riku coldly asked,

"Did you find your book?" Edward faced back to him for a second and answered the truth.

"Nope." Riku was slightly stilled by these words but nodded with a slight twitch to his lips, but ignored the feeling as he walked after Sora, to make the boy put the book back.

--------------------------------

There the four sat, around a carefully guarded artifact in a glass case, Sora was bored and playing a bit more with his hoodie, Alphonse was quiet as were the older two, though they were quiet in a very thoughtful way, but also looked bored out of their minds. Edward sighed in a really agitated way and Riku couldn't help but sigh after him...it had already been half-an-hour since the scheduled date on Psiren's note...and Riku could tell Edward's patience was quickly running out. Riku was almost grateful for the interruption from the detective, who was grinning as though he won a battle.

"Aha! She must not be showing up due to the threat of the great state alchemist!" Edward sighed once again and looked away from the artifact.

"She may have just lost the time..." Alphonse put in slightly, trying to calm down his brother slightly, as the other seemed to be getting slightly anxious.

"Or maybe some heartless got her." Riku muttered underneath his breath, and for some reason was hoping that this the case. Who knew why though? Such ridiculous thoughts.

"Yeah, those heartless are a real pain in the butt." Riku nodded once, and couldn't help but freeze slightly and turn to a grinning woman, holding the so-called artifact in her hand and waving with her other. Everyone gaped as she leapt out of a quick and easy escape and she continued leaping, while most of the boys stood there stunned.

"GET HER!" The detective screamed, tears nearly pouring out of his eyes from another failed case. Edward stood very still for the second the detective ran out the room,

"Heartless?" Riku faked innocence and shrugged,

"Who knows?" Edward glared slightly, but took out to the window that Psiren took, more then likely to follow the woman. Alphonse seemed to moan at this and followed after his brother, though at a rather slower pace then the angered Elric. Riku stared into the empty space then looked over at Sora, who blinked innocently and Riku chuckled, leading Sora out of the building and on his little quest to find the Elric brothers.

--------------------------------

"Edward...please explain to me..._how_ it is possible to hit your head _that_ hard on a wall?" Riku couldn't help but ask skeptically, folding his arms at the angry alchemist. Though Alphonse seemed to be happy with the fact that his brother got hit in the head, Riku couldn't help but think it maybe had to do with something that had to do with that preppy nurse.

"Well when you're chasing after a thief in an alleyway without any lights, I'm certain that you would bump your face into a wall too."

"Actually, I would have enough sense to stop chasing her in an alleyway." Edward glared at Riku and Riku glared back, they installed a glaring match but Sora interrupted pulling on Riku's sleeve,

"Riku..." Sora whined and Riku was stumped on what the boy could possibly want...at least until a grumpy growl erupted from his stomach and the boy looked at him with bright blue puppy dog eyes. Riku held back his moan and sighed, grabbing Sora's hand to lead him to dining hall. On the way, Riku stopped to find a very interesting sight. Clara was standing by some plants that were bathing in the sunlight, when there was a brilliant familiar light that Riku recognized as alchemy taken throughout the room. Riku rubbed his eyes and looked at Sora, to see a stubborn determined look on his face and Riku nodded back, he would have to tell Edward it seems. Riku moved out from the room's point of view and continued on his quest to help Sora for food. They had cheerfully found the dining area and as fate seemed to have it, Edward was chomping down hospital food in such a fast way, Riku thought of comparing him to a pig and its slop. Riku sat next to Edward as Sora cheerfully ran off, giggling and the nurses cooed over his cuteness and gave him food.

"So...that nurse, Clara..." Riku started, his voice sounding careful, as though not to give out his position to the other people within the business. Edward actually stopped from his eating, and nodded to acknowledge Riku's sentence.

"Yeah, I've had my thoughts on her too, of course, Alphonse doesn't agree with me." Edward grinned and Riku couldn't help but grin either, although he wondered what made Alphonse even like the preppy nurse, it was a nice feeling to think that someone in Alphonse's position could even comprehend the simple emotion of liking someone.

"Poor guy."

"That's the way it is." There were a few moments of silence then Riku asked,

"So, are you going to bust her?"

"...Not yet..." Riku couldn't contain his surprise, but he managed to limit it to his eyes. Edward saw this look easily and just gave a soft smile back,

"I found her out last night, she was taking the energy source of plants to perform her alchemy, she said she was doing it for the hospital." Riku furrowed his gaze, not believing it. "You see...this hospital's going to get demolished soon, very soon. But she says she steals to keep it alive, so other people don't die." Riku understood that, stealing for others to live sounded like a right cause, but there was still something fishy about it.

"So what are you going to do then?"

"I guess I'll wade it out." Riku rose one eyebrow,

"Wade? That doesn't seem like something you would do."

"Oh, and you've become an expert on me?" Riku folded his arms and shrugged, no of course not. It takes years and years for someone to know everything about one whom they would call a friend...years that he was going to have to repeat when it came to Sora...and what about Kairi? What if she woke up with no memories? Those years would be very long and tiresome...

"Sora!" Sora came into the conversation and Riku yelled as Sora dumped a pudding cup into his hair. Sora was sucking on a spoon that was probably the pudding before and Riku glared at Sora. Edward laughed at Riku and Riku ignored Edward for the rest of the time they were in the hospital. It was not something like Riku, he knew, but for some reason he could feel himself changing...and not just because of the slow control of the heartless in his own heart.

The night had passed as another eventful night of Edward chasing Psiren (though, this time, wisely avoiding the direct path of an alleyway). Though Riku couldn't understand for the life of him exactly _why_ Edward had let Psiren go. Earlier on, Psiren had actually been captured in a primitive trap known as a cage, and Edward had a small discussion with her and after a few minutes of silent thought, he let Psiren go. Alphonse was overjoyed, but Riku himself was irritable, but he let it be as in the morning, they all stood in front of a demolished hospital. Edward and Alphonse seemed stunned from the fact that they had been gypped, when Clara walked up, and even Sora seemed surprised as she adorned a nun attire, she sadly proclaimed that she could not save the hospital and she said she had become a woman under God, to help save the after-lives of people. Riku didn't have to see the torn down Church the next morning, as Edward got in an even sorrowful mood.

"THAT IS IT!" Edward yelled, he wasn't going to believe another word that...that...COW said. Alphonse seemed timid against his brother's anger, and Riku couldn't help but finally feel a little happy as it seemed they were finally going to go on...After all, this island was really getting on his nerves. They received Psiren's calling card and almost immediately Edward dragged everyone to the said place of thieving and Riku had to admit, it was rather nice watch Edward chase after her in the full moonlight, and perform alchemy left to right. Psiren was running for her life as she even jumped into a lake to probably swim peacefully away from Edward's grasp...A very laughable thought, especially as Edward clapped angrily and the alchemic ray of light appeared and Sora oohed as a stone hand emerged from the water and in the grasp of it was Psiren, who was struggling unhappily. Edward smirked at her confidently and Psiren looked just miserable as she admitted defeat.

"Thank you so much for capturing this thief," The detective saluted Edward and Edward did the same back as Psiren pouted in her wet leather and both hands tied back together. Psiren then grinned at Edward in a seductive way and winked,

"Yeah, it was fun playing with you. Oh and about that Philosopher's Stone, I heard a rumor that it was being made in Xenotime." Edward seemed pleasantly surprised by this and grinned once again. Alphonse even seemed to be smiling as the brigade of cops carried Psiren, or better known as Clara, off. Riku looked over at Edward, who just simply held out a hand as though a peace treaty.

"I'll let you follow us until we get back to Headquarters...and get Sora some better automail parts." Riku felt a little surprised by this, but a small smirk answered back Edward's own,

"Alright." Riku and Edward were off in a standoff for a few seconds, but reached an agreement. With that small annoying adventure, the four with unconscious girl walked the path to another pathway for what they wanted.

--------------------------------

It had been quite a few days until they arrived in Xenotime, most of the reason why was because Edward had to send out a report to his 'superior' and mysteriously the next day Edward would get a note back, in which he would burn into little bitty pieces and bury the ashes under three feet holes. Riku was continuing to grow in interest to this odd Mustang character. For someone for Edward to seem to _loathe_ entirely, and from the temper-tantrums that he had seen the state alchemist go through before, Roy Mustang had to be a very interesting person. Though, he would also probably be a person that Riku would end up hating in the end as well...but no matter.

"Riku!" Sora pouted up at him, shoving a book in his face, as though demanding the other boy to read it to him. Riku sighed and stared down at the book that Edward decided to graciously buy, Riku swore Edward had done it just to annoy him. Riku stared at the cover, which was labeled "Alchemy for Beginners" and also had Sora's name in a very hard to read text. Riku knew it had been Sora to write this, glad to know that someone was teaching Sora how to write...now if only that someone would teach Sora to read.

"Okay, okay." Sora grinned and jumped to the seat next to him, leaning against Riku so he could see the text as well. Riku sighed and opened the book, frowning as he found hard equations and a mass of symbols only on the first page. Riku hoped that it may have been an intro page, but he quickly flipped through the book and was disappointed. "Damn you Edward." Riku grimaced, trying to make to and from the other arrays and all the understandable text.

"What was that?" Edward asked and Riku couldn't help but jump as the voice came drifting from behind him. Riku then glared up at Edward and Sora grinned at him cheerfully,

"You heard me." Edward laughed, and ignored Riku's angry position and turned to Sora,

"We're just about to Xenotime." Riku nodded in acknowledgement then frowned a bit,

"What's Xenotime like?" Edward shrugged, never having been there himself. Sora seemed to smile at that thought strangely, especially as the train very soon came to a stop. Alphonse came thunking up behind his brother and Riku immediately noticed something different. "Where's Kairi?" Riku was astonished at Alphonse's response, if armor could blush, that was what Alphonse was doing. Edward grinned in a strange grin Riku never thought he would see on his face,

"He's carrying her inside," A pointed thumb gave Alphonse even more embarrassment, "After all, it would seem weird if we carried an unconscious female _everywhere_ we went." Riku nodded but he couldn't help but join in Edward's lecherous grin in teasing the younger brother.

"Niisan! It isn't like that! Riku, don't encourage him!" Alphonse seemed so embarrassed and Sora tilted his head in confusion as Edward and Riku actually joined each other in a laugh, starting to board off the station. Alphonse followed, complaining of Edward and Riku's recent behavior and Sora also just followed after, and curious on what had happened. Almost surprisingly, it wasn't that long of a walk to Xentotime. But when they arrived, the Elric brothers and two were slightly surprised that it was similar to a dust city, at least in the retrospect to the fact that it seemed empty. At least if not for the mansion and trees surrounding in the distance. When they had reached villager's sight distance, they were all surprised to watch some villagers with mining picks running by them, yelling about someone got caught in the minefields. Edward narrowed his eyes immediately and ran after the other villagers, Sora following right behind as though sensing the same kind of danger that was being said.

"Help!" There was a dark muffled voice within the mineshafts, severe coughing followed soon after. The people stood there, helpless, though many were trying to get rid of the great big clumps that had fallen. It seemed that she was also stuck under a fallen mine cart, and she was crying in fear. Edward frowned and ran foreword, clapping his hands immediately and touching the cart. What surprised Edward was that Sora was trying to do the same thing, and the huge cart disappeared into two iron blocks, popping easily on each side of the girl. Elisa stared up with wide bright eyes, her face stuck in her sob but then she jumped up and hugged Edward, continuing to cry.

"Elisa!"

"Papa!" The two were met together again and Edward couldn't help but grin. All the people who had came to help looked at their heroes with praise. Edward continued to grin, although in the back of his mind wheels were turning more and more about Sora. How very strange, the boy had clapped his hands, perfectly imitating him and they both had the same intention in mind, turning the cart into iron. How very strange.

"Ah, you're welcome." Edward suddenly burst, as several thank yous and praises came his way. Sora blinked as the same things went his way, but he wasn't sure how to react, so he ran behind Riku, looking that same curious look but afraid to ask the question. Riku sighed and just bowed his head in every time they were thanked. Sora was maturing a bit at least, Riku thought. Though Riku also found it strange that Sora could just clap his hands and perform alchemy just like Edward. But no matter, as long as Sora was happy and for once wasn't getting into trouble.

"No, no, please, we should thank you for helping Elisa, please, come have a treat with us." Edward grinned warily,

"I'm sorry but we really should get go-"

"Nonsense!" Edward yelled as he was lifted over the older and taller man over his shoulder, Edward complained massively while everyone just followed faithfully, that including Alphonse, Riku, and Sora. When they had reached to a homely inn there was a large gathering around where the man had forced Edward to sit and food brought to the tables, everyone was eating and drinking ale or other types happily. Edward sighed, looking actually grateful for food. Riku prepared himself for strange food and strange ways to eat, but for once there were no too foreign of food and Riku could finally eat without being too suspicious. Sora of course was digging in it when there was a loud slam of a door.

"Elisa! Elisa! Is she alright?" The party quieted down coldly, everyone was giving the man cold glares. The man had strange blackish type of hair while it covered his left eye, and he seemed to be out of breath for traveling. The man calmed himself and stared around, happily spotting Elisa but her father marched up, staring at him with a set glare.

"What are you doing here?"

"I came to see if Elisa was alright!"

"You're the one who sent her to the mines in the first place aren't you? Bastard!" The man started to draw out his fist but was stopped as Elisa came up hugging her father, begging for her not to hurt her uncle. The father heaved a sigh and banished the other to go away. The other nodded and bid Elisa a happy good-bye, happy to see her in good condition and walked out of the tavern. There were a few moments of silence because of the anger and tension there was earlier, but soon the party started again.

"I heard the Philosopher's Stone is going to complete soon." Riku knew Edward listening by the peak of his eye contact, slightly moving towards whom was speaking.

"Ah, you seem interested in the stone." The father came to sit next to Edward, grinning almost eagerly, "Are you here to help aid Doctor Magwar?" Edward tilted one eyebrow up and Riku couldn't help but notice the look of intrigue, however there was also a slight frown on his end. Edward was seeing something that Riku was not.

"Yeah I suppose," Edward finally replied, looking away for a second to drink a cup of juice. Riku almost coughed out his juice as Alphonse prevented Sora from eating a fork once again.

"That's great, Doctor Magwar could always use new minds to help with the research for the stone...by the way, what are all of your names?" Riku frowned, hearing a bit of a testy tone in the voice, but only showed his concern through his frown. Edward grinned cockily however,

"I'm Edward Elric, and this is my brother, Alphonse Elric." The tavern seemed to pause once again, throwing glares towards the brothers. The man held a firm fake grin on his face, as though waiting to find out the remaining names. Riku frowned and sighed as Sora proclaimed cheerfully,

"Sora!" But Riku refused to give his name and put this firm thought across his face, waiting for the man to make his move.

"But that's not possible." One of the people in the crowd muttered coolly, and Edward blinked, this time in pure curiosity.

"And why not?"

"Because the real Elric brothers are already helping Dr. Magwar." This stunned Edward and Alphonse into a deep pause, a pause of pure shock. Even Riku had paused from his set frown, that was very, _very_ strange. Riku was then very surprised when they found themselves outside of the tavern, thrown out and all over each other. Except Sora, Sora was escorted in a kind way, which irritated Riku to no end. Riku wasn't then to surprised when Edward moved from his ground position and started to yell on the top of his lungs at the tavern, and Riku surmised that, that was pretty loud.

"I'M GOING TO FIND THOSE DAMNED BASTARDS AND RIP THEIR THROATS OUT!" Riku got up from the ground, dusting off the dirt, really not used to the physics of this strange land, and he continued to stare at Edward while Sora looked quite surprised. Alphonse also got up, and Riku helped him check if Kairi was okay, which she was but Riku noticed something before the helmet was placed back on, a strange kind of symbol just below the armor set. Kairi was fine, still in her coma state. The three then stood there, waiting for Edward to stop being so pissy, and when Edward finally did turn to the three, Riku and Alphonse found themselves growing increasingly nervous. The strange smile on Edward's face did not help this state.

"Ed...?" Alphonse asked nervously, as the boy then started to move towards the pathway for the mansion they had seen earlier.

"Ed?" Sora actually questioned, walking right next to him, therefore leaving Riku and Alphonse no choice to follow as well, both continuing to grow nervous. They had soon all reached to the mansion, however, not the front entrance.

"Niisan! Don't tell me you're thinking of breaking in." Alphonse almost whined, but Edward told him to shush, looking through the side-way bricks, grinning a vicious grin as he found one that seemed slightly moveable. Edward clapped his hands softly and surprisingly there was just a little light from the alchemic array and a new door was made.

"That really is your motto isn't it?" Riku couldn't help but say sarcastically as Edward ignored him and went straight through. Creeping through the clumped hallways, Riku couldn't help but think they were all on some kind of wild goose chase. As much as Riku wanted to, he could see Sora right next to Edward, walking almost eagerly, as though there was a dangerous anxious smell of adventure nearby. Riku stifled a moan, Sora was slowly becoming more and more troublesome...

"A-ha!" Edward proclaimed cheerfully as he finally encountered a door. Riku had to blink slowly to comprehend just _why_ Edward had just..._walked_ through the door...without any sort of precautions at all. Riku then just sighed and followed after, hating the fact that Sora seemed to be following Edward quite faithfully. Damn Sora's childish mind. So when they had entered the room, Riku was surprised to find it relatively peaceful, just with a lot of plants on counters. Riku watched out carefully as Edward and Alphonse looked at the plants and research left lying around. Sora had wandered off a little bit, staring at the plants as well, though looking determined about something, Riku could only guess what.

"What do we have here?" Riku turned immediately, tensing himself and for once he couldn't feel the heartless for that second. Right from another door, was a straight standing blonde with brown eyes, he was staring directly at Edward, smirking a strange smile. Edward turned back and smirked right back, Riku couldn't help but feel as though he was in the middle of something that would not be very pretty.

"Heh, so you're the bastard pulling off the imposter trick, eh?" Edward asked, and Riku's feeling couldn't but build up inside and the heartless found themselves once again to relish the strange feelings.

"What are you talking about?" The other boy smirked back, "I am Edward Elric." Edward really got pissed about this and Riku wasn't too surprised when the boy charged, throwing out punches and kicks like crazy. However the imposter was doing a best job of running the hell out of Edward's range. There were loud groans of sighs as Riku prevented Sora from helping the frustrated blonde. _But_, Riku thought, admitting it to himself, this imposter of Edward was doing very well in the physical fight with Edward. Especially as Edward swung his automail arm, and the other used the wall as leverage to kick Edward in the chest. Edward growled, but he was smiling an incredible smile.

"You're not bad."

"You as well." The other replied, smiling the strange smile that Edward was. Riku couldn't help but frown as Edward clapped his hands together and formed a blade with his automail arm and charged. The other didn't seem to shocked, but he reached into his back pocket and clapped unto the wall to bring out a blade for his own purposes. The clash of metal and very hard stone clanged in the background as Sora was struggling in Alphonse's hold. Riku stood still, as he couldn't help but sense the hidden cheeriness as the two battled each other, as though they were learning from each other within the battle. How very strange...

"Brother!" There was a grunt as Edward had grazed the imposter's shoulder by surprise as a little one with bright blonde hair, while dressed in green ran out of the door that the imposter had came out of earlier. Riku frowned, tightening himself as he saw gashes at the sides of the intruder.

"What are you doing?" The imposter yelled, holding his shoulder as he jumped away from Edward's more penetrating graze. The other younger boy started to look like he was panicking but Riku knew that was more out of fear from what caused the boy's damage to him. Heartless were around...Damn, what took him so long to sense them?

"Ed, no time to argue with the idiots! We got to get out of here!" Riku demanded, and Edward looked back for a second, and his gaze went wide. Riku turned around quickly and yelled as an air soldier heartless crashed through his stomach. Riku yelled out in pain, having never felt the crash of the heartless first hand like this. However, he had managed to keep balance and clapped his hands, forcing them to the ground and taking out his own blade and quickly slaying the enemy. Alphonse was no longer holding back Sora, and Sora joined Riku in the ranks of fighting off the heartless as Alphonse tried to fend off the heartless that came his way with a form of martial arts.

"DAMN IT! Not these things again!" Edward screamed, clapping his hands once again and drawing an array of light within the stones, the heartless shrieking almost immediately and went back to regroup. Edward growled and looked back at the other two, then back at his group, growling as he joined them.

"Sorry about our hasty retreat, but-" Alphonse started but the chaos all stopped when Sora clapped his hands and placed them on the ground. Stunned looks appeared on every face, even Riku's, as keyblades popped from the ground and the heartless all in range, disappeared in the purple haze. But the keyblades looked different, Riku couldn't see how they looked different as the purple mist covered the area in a second as the keyblades disappeared, but he _knew_ there was something different about them. The stunned looks continued but Riku was the first to move, growling and running to see the state of the town. If there were so many heartless...they probably got all those towns people! That would be terrible! Although Riku didn't know why he was so concerned, especially after haven received such rude treatment earlier...but, there was still something that was wrong. There were too many things that were out of place, there was just too much chaos!

_What the **HELL** is going on here?_

--------------------------------

"..." A dark-haired looking youth stared up at the ceiling of the underground facility, and with a very annoyed look on his face.

"Is...is something wrong?" The youth scoffed, just simply pushing back his dark green hair in even of an annoyed way, but looked straight at the man who looked slightly terrified of him. Then again, he could never blame him, humans were so weak.

"No, there's nothing, however...you need to finish the Philosopher's Stone. Soon." The man twitched a little, looking very nervous but the other didn't care, and looked away, frowning as more debris fell from the ceiling. There was something big going on upstairs, he couldn't help but wonder for a second what could it be, but he didn't care.

"Ah...Ma...Master Envy, why would you need it so soon? We have gotten closer yes, but we haven't been able to focus on making the red water into anything but red rocks, and while these are great catalysts for power increa-" The doctor was soon cut off by Envy, the other had brutally against the wall with one hand spread out against his throat. The doctor started to choke immediately and Envy stared up with one pure purple eye that highlighted in the darkness as an evil glare,

"I could care less about that, however, I'm giving you orders, and you will fill them out, or _else_." Envy gave the man a longer glare to the choking man and released him coolly, a grin that didn't seem to fit the man measured upon his face, "Got it?" The man nodded, choking as he coughed brutally through his covered mouth. Envy simply moved away, with superior speeds and was soon on the surface. However when he reached the top, he found something incredibly strange. A strange physical form that looked like it was from the shadows, but...Envy stood up even taller as several of the strange shadow things crawled over around him for a second, and as an amusement for himself, Envy kicked one of them. It surprised him just a bit when the shadow disappeared into a pinkish-purple mist, but what interested him even more was the fact that the other shadows didn't attack him, in fact...they just passed him. Envy folded his arms, and shrugged, not really caring about said situation, even _if_ it was weird.

--------------------------------

The town...it was...all okay? Riku frowned darkly, how could this have been possible? There were so many of them, and that would require the hearts of so many people, but the town was untouched, and the heartless were no longer crawling around. Just around the mansion...and Sora had rid of all of those, or at least from what Riku could have sense. Riku growled, and wasn't surprised when he heard Edward mimic the same motion.

"Those things are really starting to piss me off!" Edward yelled as he sat on a rock on the ground. Riku nodded, these forms of the heartless were starting to annoy him too...in fact, he had to get himself healed soon if he didn't want that a bruise on his stomach.

"Sora..." Sora managed to put in, staring down at his hands with a strange fascinated look. As though he just realized that he performed alchemy...a strange form, but alchemy no less. Edward looked over at Sora, a strange look spreading across his face that Riku did not like at all. But then again, Riku couldn't blame him entirely, Riku wanted to know how exactly Sora was able to do that. Riku knew that the physics of the other worlds magics and this worlds 'magic' were merging together, soon he would probably become limited like Edward had said, forced for the rule of 'equivalent trade', but Sora...all those keyblades in the same array of light that Edward has used in less then a few moments. Could Sora really have learned something like that technique just by instinct? But that wasn't possible...was it?

"I wonder why those things haven't followed us..." Alphonse silently put in, breaking the thoughts of Sora's new ability. Edward looked back on the moonlighted road to see the truth of the fact that the strange creatures were indeed no longer following them.

"Sora got all the ones that were there." Riku simply replied, groaning as he felt over-exhausted for some reason. Everything was starting to finally catch up to him, even the heartless in his heart seemed tired and begged Riku to rest the body. "In the meantime, where are we going to rest?"

"I really don't think there's even a safe place around here." Edward scoffed and Riku shook his head, pointing to the many undisturbed houses,

"Those things have a strange attack pattern, haven't you noticed? When they attack a place, they will leave every other place alone." Edward frowned and folded his arms,

"Yes, but what I've also noticed is that they appear around us, every single time." Riku twitched slightly, but left it to Edward's imagination to figure out what the body language meant.

"But we really need to find a place to rest." Riku sighed, sitting next to Edward on the over-sized rock, for once not minding if he looked weary to the others. "I haven't been feeling well."

"Riku!" Sora looked concerned and Riku just laughed him off for once. It always felt strange to feel as though you were out of strength, but there wasn't anything else he could do, was there?

"You're the Elric brothers, aren't you?" The two looked at the startlingly figure they had not expect to appear at all, after all, he had made no sound at all. It was the man that Elisa said was her uncle. Edward tensed up though, seeing the exhausted forces of his team,

"And what of it?"

"You saved Elisa today, didn't you?" Edward nodded to confirm this, staring at the man with the dark-hair. "Do you need a place to stay?" The man asked almost kindly, looking over at Riku, who was struggling himself to keep awake. How very strange, he was so active a few minutes ago...what had changed energy so quickly?

"...Yes..." Edward admitted, not looking ashamed, but very open to the man. The man sighed and continued to look over at the tired group,

"My name is Dr. Vercio, you can come stay with me."

* * *

/Yelps as she hears the shrieks of everyone/ I know! I know! I'm so sorry! I had to stop right there, the chapter was long enough! I nearly cried myself to sleep every night because I couldn't finish this chapter's ending for so long! Eriku-kun, you know how I feel! Anyway! I bow to you all once again, and I'm terribly sorry it took awhile, but it's worth it, isn't it? I hope it is...and yes, if you want, you can kill me from tearing the canon from the anime. I have been attempting to make it as different as possible...go me/Cries/ Anyway, if you are curious about the girl that Sora knocked out earlier in the chapter, no she is not dead. In fact, she just has a concussion, and is treated by a supreme doctor and meets the doctor's son and falls in love with him and in the future they grow up, get married, and have five children. So she's okay, poor Sora though. I'm so mean! GAH! I know that some of Sora's abilities will not make sense right now, but they will in the future, and more expos will come later. Also, I decided to include Axel and the rest of the Members in the story...why? Because Axel is the awesome, that or I have a thing for redheads. ANYway! That was chapter two, forgive me for my lameness and laziness...and stopping at a terrible place I guess. But I had to save it, otherwise I wouldn't have much except the funny 13th episode! I'm very sorry, and I hope you enjoyed this chapter! Thank you again for reading!

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	3. III

WAH! Gomen Nasai, Gomen Nasai! I'm so sorry it took me forever to update, it's just that I started to work on other fanfics...my first mpreg for that. So it took me forever to start balancing a quota for that and at least write five paragraphs for this. Well, anyway. this chapter is probably mostly called a filler chapter with a little side-action from Fletcher and Russel...But that's about it, but I'll enjoy typing up Mustang. Oh yeah, Mustang refers to Edward as "Hagane no" because in Japanese that is basically means FullMetal, so there you go. I believe that's about all that I need to say. Also Roy Mustang's Japanese voice, is the sex. Yes, yes it is.

I do not own Kingdom Hearts and FullMetal Alchemist.

The warnings that were in the first chapter are also in this chapter, whoo! Also I guess I should also put in if you haven't played KH2, then you're screwed for spoilers.

Also uhh...unproven theories?

**_Treaded Steps_  
III.**

Riku had taken his time in adjusting to the bed on the ground that the doctor had so kindly supplied him. Right now, his mind was racked in thought, trying to perfectly understand the whole situation...but failing completely. It was in the middle of the night, and Riku knew that he should be tired, but he really was nowhere near the point of exhaustion he was just a few hours ago. Riku grunted as he lifted himself up and moved his gaze over towards Sora. The boy was facing a wall, his spiky brown hair limping slightly as the boy was holding himself tightly and just facing the wall. Riku sighed and got up, trailing to sit himself next to Sora.

"Hey, what's up?" Riku questioned, a slight smile on his face as Sora faced him in surprise. Sora stared at him blankly then held up both of his hands, one of pure steel and the other of a living flesh.

"Riku...H...How?" Sora tried to continue with his sentence but he really struggled with it, but from what Riku could tell, it wasn't because he didn't know how to say the sentence...but because he was afraid of asking the question. Riku sighed, he knew Sora well enough though, the boy wanted to know how he was able to even summon the keyblade...and how he was able to perform alchemy with a simple clap of the hands and even summon more keyblades. Riku didn't think it should be possible, there is only one keyblade...right?

"I don't know Sora." Riku replied back softly and Sora gave him a very sad look. Riku looked over at Sora and gave a small smile, "Hey, don't worry, we'll get answers." Sora nodded slowly then moved so he was holding his hands, flinching slightly. It must be very strange, Riku thought, the boy could hardly remember sensations through all the parts of his body, and now he was getting new experiences with metal limbs. Riku sighed and patted Sora's head, finding it a comfortable motion for the both of them, "Don't worry about it, okay?" Sora nodded again at these words, just appearing a little more forlorn. Riku sighed again, "Hey, shouldn't you be sleeping?" Sora twitched slightly and looked at Riku with a semi-innocent look. Riku gave him a glare in reply, "Alright, in to bed with you." Riku commented, though the realization of sounding very much like a mother appeared within his mind, he ignored the voice and pushed Sora down onto the blanket on the ground. Sora struggled, just like he would back when the two were five-years-old, but Riku easily bypassed Sora's moving arms and wrapping the boy forcibly in the blanket. Sora pouted up at him,

"No fair!" He claimed and Riku just gave Sora a smirk, getting up and walking outside the door, closing said door very softly, all to get some fresh air. Sora looked at the door with intent eyes then got up and started to search his body.

"Ooh...thank you Sora." A small voice said softly, especially as Sora put his finger over his lips, telling the small thing in his hands to be quiet. An insect that was similar to a man with its strange figure stood from Sora's coupled hands, the insect had a black over-coat with dark red pants and a dark hat on top of his head. The insect stared at Sora with what looked like a look of awe. "So much really has happened, I can hardly believe it." Sora nodded slightly, then frowned at Jiminy, looking as though he was expecting an answer. "Sora, I can only tell you what's in the book." Sora frowned again, he still couldn't read any words but Jiminy was trying to teach him.

"Book?" The cricket nodded and jumped from Sora's hands and started to shuffle his glove hands around in his pockets, looking for the book that he had been talking about earlier.

"It's just so unbelievable, I can hardly believe that I survived with you, and then a big chunk of my memory is gone too!" The insect looked around his coat some more, frowning as he had yet to manage to find the object. "Ah-ha!" The cricket cried out successfully and Sora looked over his shoulder to keep look out as Jiminy made the book bigger in size with a small blinding light. Sora then frowned as he actually thought of something he hadn't before,

"Why..." Sora tried to think up a word to use, but he couldn't so he conveyed the rest of his sentence with a clapping of his hands, the symbol for the use of alchemy (or so he believed). Jiminy frowned, thinking then nodded slightly,

"Perhaps it's because it's the King's magic, Mickey was usually always impervious to the effects of another world, even the world's choice of magic." Sora stared blankly at the cricket and Jiminy just shook his head. Sora then shrugged carelessly and opened the book, skimming through the pictures but then stopped as he reached a picture of Riku. Jiminy saw him stay on that page and coughed, "It's probably best not to be on this page, keep turning the pages Sora." Sora looked at him in a confused motion but then turned more pages, and once again stopped at another page, this time with Kairi upon the frames of the pages. Sora took a glance over to the sleeping girl, who was on a bed unlike the rest of the boys, she looked so...Sora didn't know what, but he didn't like it.

"Kairi..." Sora breathed slightly and the corpse took a short breath, before falling back down. Jiminy jumped,

"You remembered her name!" Sora turned and nodded, a genuine smile on his face as he turned the page. This book was pretty cool, it had pictures. Sora stopped again at a page of someone he recognized,

"...Aerith?" Sora asked, his eyes squinting slightly as he felt a major pain in his head starting to build up. Jiminy blinked and looked up at Sora, and after a few moments of thinking he nodded,

"That's enough for tonight Sora." The boy blinked at the cricket as said insect gathered the book back into a small carrible substance and jumped back into Sora's rough brown hair, "Good night." Sora frowned, though the idea of going to sleep was very appealing, especially with this racking pain in his head and down below, just near his left...Sora rested down and closed his eyes gently.

Riku stood outside, unaware of Sora's experience with the book and he looked up to the moon and the many other worlds that hung in the skies. A loud sigh overcame him as he looked around once again to survey the area, no...no heartless. It was so strange, ever since Sora had performed his new trick in alchemy, the heartless just stopped...showing up. Even the heartless that stirred very slowly in his own heart was gone from his mind, but he still had control over the dark powers that was given to him not just a week ago. Riku frowned again, clenching his feet and focused his hands around the darkness surrounding him and tried to force little shadows to appear from the darkness. Riku saw himself glowing, green light surrounding him as he grunted in effort but there was no reward as Riku collapsed to the ground, breathing deeply from exhaustion. How...how as this possible? It shouldn't be! Why was this so hard? Riku growled then clapped his hands together and placed them within the shadows, and nothing happened. Why...Why was it that SORA had another power that he didn't have? How was this possible?

Riku stood back up, glaring at the shadows slightly, then looked back to the little house that held all of them. Riku breathed in and out, wondering slightly what had come over him then went back in the little hovel, seeing everyone was perfectly safe. This didn't make sense though, how was he able to make a weapon from the ground, yet not produce more shadows? This was just so...Riku shook his head and went back to his little corner, falling asleep to a position where he could watch over Sora, as the boy breathed in and out uneasily.

--------------------------------

Mere shadows of cloaks, for the very first time in a very long time, actually since they came to each other, stepped into a light. A light where they could sit, discuss the issues that waged behind the scenes. All of them had their head cloaked, except one who had his head visibly showing as he was broadcasted as the leader of the entire group. Unknown to the group though, another was watching through technology he was surprised was working. This man, the only thing you could see from that man, asides from his attire, was a piercing golden eye. Overall there were thirteen members, including this man from a far away spectacle as to not get involved and betray his presence. DiZ peered around the 'meeting' room and stared rather blankly at the beings called Nobodies. The leader then gave a heavy sigh, drawing all of their attention and a heavy voice erupted from his mouth,

"There is trouble upon the surface."

"Yes...and it is...rather troubling." DiZ looked over to the one who had said that, and just stared blankly as he placed his helm away from his head. Of course, Axel. Redheaded, crazy spiky hair, and well, a bit of a pyromaniac. He was just one of those smooth talkers that had to always have the last word.

"Hm? What could ever be the trouble?" Vexan, a pale looking member with dirty blonde hair that split from his head in two forms. DiZ gave a frown from beneath his bandages and looked over back to Axel to see him chatting to the member who he sat by. Ah, Roxas...Normally they were all supposed to sit in order, but DiZ felt he didn't mind the little chaos between the seating arrangement, and the leader didn't seem to mind as well as he made no comment about the one-sided conversation between the two.

"Even if there is trouble, there's not much we can do against it." This time it was a silver-haired young looking adult, his hair cascading in front of his face and his tone was a not so amused one. This one was Zexion.

"Not necessarily." The only female in the entire group spoke up, her hair was a bright blonde that spiked up slightly like antennae. Her name was Larxene.

"Oh, what do you propose?" Saix, more of a blue-haired being with an obsession with the moon spoke, looking over at the female.

"Why not have some of us go down and check things out?"

"W-Wait!" Demyx, a spiky-haired dirty blonde spoke, "What would the problem be for us to have to go down there?"

"Maybe we should send you down, just to irritate you." Larxene gave an evil grin and punched the sitar player on the shoulder. Demyx visibly cringed, but made no comment or movement otherwise as Xemnas, a silver haired being that looked similar to Saix, but was darker in skin tone, the leader, spoke,

"The problem is that Sora has not been purging the heartless as he usually does. At that, every time a heartless goes, it seems that a different method takes them back down, preventing them to build up to Kingdom Hearts." Oh? So that's the reason for this meeting, DiZ mused to himself, and slightly inwardly glad that something was wrong with that, but extremely became curious because of the fact that there were minimal forces that could stop a heart from going where it belongs after it's been purged.

"Oh...that is a problem." Demyx admitted and even the silent members 'hmmmed'.

"Well with that said, I wager we should have the minimum of four of us going down there." Luxord, a bright haired man who loved to gamble spoke, a grin upon his non-clean face.

"I volunteer!" Axel commented, "But of course, Roxas will come with me!" Roxas was the only member who had yet to uncloak part of his helm.

"If Axel's going, I'm going too!" Larxene forcefully said, and nobody found the guts to actually remark back to her. "And just to help him build up some guts, Demyx shall be coming with us!" The other seemed to want to protest but with a haughty glare over to him, he quickly shut his mouth and looked rather downcast.

"Great, it's all settled. Get going...ah yes...we don't want to rise who we are just yet, so as soon as possible, get some different clothes." Xenmas spoke and was silenced as he saw a bright hopeful look on Larxene's eyes.

"Yes sir! Let's get going boys!" Larxene yelled, said two boys yelped as she kicked their caboose and ran as she chased after them with a maleficent glee. Roxas however was not kicked and he just followed after the cackling blonde, with a dull look through the stance of his outfit.

"...Is that called 'unleashing the hurricane'?" Lexaeus, a bright brown-haired big man commented and Zexion chuckled lightly,

"Indeed, I believe that is what it is called." Now where were they going? DiZ asked himself, not completely sure of a world out there that had the power to stop traveling hearts.

--------------------------------

"So what are we going to do about the imposters?" Riku asked from over a few pieces of toast, chewing lightly at the edges. Edward shrugged, biting also into a few pieces of toast as it seemed to be the only thing edible in front of him...well accept for a basket of lemons, but even Edward wasn't _THAT_ desperate. Edward shrugged, not knowing the answer to that question. The doctor soon came in with his niece tagging along with a bright smile. Edward grinned back at her,

"You know, if you'd stop being phonies, the town would welcome you." Edward twitched and strained to keep his grin on his face and Riku couldn't help but smirk. Alphonse came into the room with Sora on top of his battle plate yelling cheerfully about a ride and Alphonse just sighed over it.

"Yeah, yeah, anyway, I'm going to go investigate something, because something smells cheesy in this whole place."

"Going to try and go to the library Ed?" Riku asked then the little girl who was at the edge of the table blinked at that idea.

"Yeah."

"All the books are in Mr. Magwar's office," she then pouted slightly, "hey, hey, were you the four who went sneaking into his place? The town's angry about that..." it was then when she set off on a viscous cycle of coughs.

"Elisa!"

"I-" coughcouchHACKcough, "I'm fine uncle..." Vercio frowned and dragged the girl to his bed (though the man was surprised to see that the girl who had been laying there before was gone) and gently forced her to rest in the bed. When the adult came back out, he saw himself under the speculative gaze of Edward Elric.

"That kind of sounds bad for a regular cold," Alphonse started, staring over at the entrance to the bedroom with a tone that told the group that he may as well been frowning. Vercio frowned and looked over at the entrance as well,

"Yeah, she's had it for awhile, and it isn't just Elisa, there are many more young and old ones that have been having it and it's been wiping them out...our medicine can't do anything to stop it." Vercio frowned in a bit of a distressed way and Riku found himself silent. That was a shame, and seemed extremely sad but there wasn't anything that they could do about it, it was all about the human's natural body system.

"...Why does the town want the Philosopher's Stone so badly?" Alphonse asked, "I mean, you could be concentrating on getting everyone healed financially, couldn't you?" Vercio slightly shook his head and then stared out of a window that blazed a beautiful light.

"This town used to be a miner's town, as you could probably tell from all the old equipment out near the edges of the town," The group nodded except Sora who seemed to have a little difficulty understanding but seemed to be tagging along to the story, "the town grew up on the beauty of gold and thrived on the people who would come to visit to look and buy all of this gold. However, it was soon that the town's mines died because there was no more gold."

"When did the colds start?" Edward abruptly interrupted and the man seemed confused about the question. So did Alphonse and Riku, what could Edward get from possibly knowing that knowledge?

"Right then Magwar came into the town, started researching the Philosopher's Stone. The weird thing is though, after he managed to make gold start producing in the mine's again, it got worse. The only thing that saved the babies born at that time was a kind man who manage to heal them." Edward seemed to jump at this a little, somewhat eager to know more,

"Really? What did this man do?" Vercio blinked then shrugged,

"I'm not quite sure. All he did was bring out something and a light shined...but it cured whatever was wrong with the children at the time." Edward looked over at Alphonse, an eager light shining in his eyes.

"What was this man's name?"

"Dr. Marcoh, I think. I can't remember clearly, it's been a long time."

"You said that the mine's gold was restored, what happened to that?" Riku asked, hearing part of the story not come together completely and disliked it that it was lost on him on what could have happened.

"It quickly disappeared as there was only a few more materials for the town's purposes." The older man sighed darkly, "I keep saying that we should just start over as a farming land, but the thought of disappearing from their leisureable lives frighten them far too much."

"You also said that this Marcoh cured the one's who were sick, why are they still sick?" Vercio just shook his head,

"It's only been recent that they've been getting worse. I have no idea why though." Edward 'hmmmed', his mind going over the grueling information while Riku also tried to think about it. Was there something in alchemy that could cause many people to grow sick? Riku wasn't sure and he wasn't reassured by the idea and looked over at Sora who still seemed to be as healthy as ever. It was then Elisa's coughing was heard from the doorway and Vercio sighed heavily.

"I'll go get medicine for her." Alphonse volunteered, not liking to hear the poor little girl sick in that room. Vercio looked up at the full plate that Sora had finally climbed down from,

"That's very kind of you, if you could, that would be good." Alphonse nodded his helmet and walked outside the quaint little home with Sora following him with a puppy-eyed look of finally understanding the tragedy that was going through the town. So it was only the three of them left and Edward stared down the dark-haired man.

"So it all started when Magwar came to town?" The man nodded and Edward narrowed his eyes. "One more question," Edward started, "who was helping Magwar before the fake Elrics?" The older man seemed to pause at this, becoming a little hesitant to part with that information but gave in as Edward's eyes demanded the truth.

"Nash Tringham, but it was weird back then, because I knew Nash, and he studied mostly something he called red water." Vercio then looked down, "as soon as the mine's were full again though, he disappeared." Edward's eyes narrowed as well as Riku's, both knowing what that somewhat implied.

"Red water, huh?" Edward then stood up and left the little house and Riku followed, being curious on if Edward knew what this whole situation was about. Riku could piece in little bits of information, but not everything as he did not know everything about the world.

"What's red water, Ed?" Edward shook his head and frowned,

"It's a substance that is usually a catalyst for alchemy. There isn't much else to know about it, so I find it kind of fishy to hear that someone had been researching it just disappeared as soon as the mine's came back in order." Riku agreed inwardly, narrowing his eyes in suspicion. This town had a lot more to it then what was broadcasted.

"So what are we going to do?" Edward looked over to Riku and nodded for him to follow and simply spoke,

"Reserch."

--------------------------------

Alphonse was a little surprised when Sora kept silent most of the time on their way to the grocer who sold medicine for colds. Alphonse had to peer back every once in awhile to make sure that Sora was still following after him and Alphonse felt his heart tug every time he looked at Sora because the boy would have a sad look upon his face.

"Al...cold?" Sora finally spoke as they had made it closer to a bunched up buildings that would be called a market in the usual modern day world. Alphonse tried to connect what Sora meant and hoped he assumed correct,

"Remember when we were Aquaroya? You had a cold then." Sora seemed to understand that and his forehead bunched together.

"Why Elisa cold?" Sora asked, confused on the effects of the cold. He sneezed and felt terrible, but Elisa looked worse then he did when he had his cold. Sora wanted to know why she looked worse and why she had a cold in the first place. Sora remembered Riku telling him that Sora had a cold because he had been in that water far too long and it was also cold out.

"I don't know Sora." Alphonse answered honestly and was slightly saddened that he didn't know. "But it'll be okay Sora, I'm sure Elisa will get better like you did." Sora seemed to cheer up from this and grinned brightly. So it wasn't long before they manage to come across a place that directly had a board that said PHARMACY on it and Alphonse and Sora entered in slowly. Alphonse felt himself twitching slightly as he saw people glaring at him and Sora because of the (true) rumors of the group sneaking into their 'saviors' home and causing a mess up there. Alphonse went up to the counter and breathed somewhat heavily as he started to speak, "I'm here to get some cold medicine."

"We don't have any stock." The woman at the counter coldly replied, a glare read all over her face and alarms went blazing in the back of Alphonse's head. Alphonse then heaved another sigh from his armor and replied,

"Are you sure?"

"Positive." The woman grunted and Sora could sense something was wrong. He looked around to look at everyone else and found that they were all staring at him with a look of hatred, Sora found that he really didn't like that. Sora then looked over at the woman and peered inward to beyond the woman's stature and frowned as he saw many foreign words but he could make out the gist of one section that was specifically labeled cold.

"For Elisa!" Sora yelled, jumping on the counter and everyone jumped as Sora tried to make it further in to get the medicine and saw that these people did not want him to get it. Sora wondered why in the back of his mind, but would not let that question impugn on his quest. However he was quickly pulled back by Alphonse's strength and the lady behind the big counter pushing him and he fell to the ground.

"Humph, as if any of you would go on a quest to saving people," Alphonse found himself growing slightly sad, "now get out of here! Your kind of lies won't work here!" Sora struggled from Alphonse's arms, pouting extremely.

"No lie! Elisa cold!" Sora found himself straining to actually wanting a better vocabulary, one like Riku, just so he could use his charisma to persuade the evil old lady to give him the medicine they needed for that poor little girl lying in the bed. Alphonse's armor creaked in a tired way and bowed his helmet once before taking out a yelling and screaming tantrum Sora who was yelling the curses he had learned from Edward at the town's people. Oh yeah, that was going to get them on their good side, then again, Alphonse timidly wanted to do the same. So the two wandered and found themselves sitting on a brick wall, not knowing what else to do and both did not want to go back empty handed.

"H-Here." They both looked up and blinked as they saw the young boy from last night, the younger brother that had taken the name of Alphonse. Alphonse felt no malice as he saw a brown bag in the young boy's hands. Alphonse gracefully took the brown back and peered in to see cold medicine that the two had been trying to get.

"Thank you." Alphonse said, the whole issue of this boy having stolen his name escaping his mind. The boy nodded and Sora also said thank you and he sat by the huge armor piece.

"So...you're the real Alphonse Elric." The boy noted, looking over the huge piece and wondered inwardly how big the boy was on the inside, not knowing there was a lack of a body in there. Alphonse nodded and they sat there in silence for a bit. "I...I'm sorry." The boy said, hoping that it would help make up for the fact that they had started this whole mischief.

"I'm sure you had a good reason. I'm not like Ed, I don't really care about the whole thing." Alphonse answered truthfully but then looked over to give the boy the piercing stare that only the battle armor could give, "I have a question though. What's your real name?"

"Fletcher." The boy obliged kindly and Sora found himself smiling. It sounded like a nice name, and this Fletcher was actually a nice boy. Sora was glad that he was around to buy the medicine, it made Sora feel better. There were a few more moments of silence as Sora swung his legs not knowing what else they were still around each other though. "...You're not going to ask why?"

"Like I said, I'm sure you had a good reason...though now that you bring it up." Sora blinked as he heard Alphonse's curiosity seeping through his tone and Sora heard himself say that Riku would call this diplomacy in the back of his eager mind. Fletcher seemed a little stunned for a moment then started to look at the ground with a somewhat miserable face.

"We came here looking for our dad, because we had heard that he had been researching something over here. But we found out that he moved on..." Fletcher paused at that sentence, not knowing what else to say to it because even Fletcher knew that something was wrong with that, "and instead of moving on, my brother saw that Mr. Magwar was researching the same thing that our father was researching."

"The Philosopher's Stone?" Fletcher looked over at Alphonse, wondering if he should say anything more then what could be speculated but decided not to as it seemed that he was already telling more then he should. Fletcher shook his head though, leaving Alphonse confused on the subject but he made no comment as he knew from his many years of having to listen to his older brother, he knew was the time to keep quiet. Sora blinked though, not quite getting it. Researching something that wasn't the Philosopher's Stone? But weren't the townspeople saying that they were trying to produce one? Sora knew very little details about the Philosopher's Stone because Riku read it to him in one of the books and it was discarded as myth in the book but Sora knew that it couldn't be one simply for the fact that Edward was looking so fevertly for it. However Sora let the information lay as Fletcher continued, it was making Sora confused anyway.

"I think my brother was thinking that if we could research what our father was, we'd get closer to him." Fletcher seemed to become a little sadder and Sora stood up, patting the boy on the back, which Fletcher seemed to appreciate but made no movement, otherwise. Alphonse couldn't quite figure it out but he made the comment,

"And that's why you needed our names."

"Mr. Magwar wouldn't even bother with us if he knew who we were. So we needed someone famous, and there was only you two that fit the description of us." Alphonse nodded at that, because it made sense. Fletcher heaved a sigh when there was a figure running down from the brick wall.

"What are you doing?" The fake Edward yelled then looked off into the path he had just ran down from and shook his head quickly. "Come on!" The fake Ed ran towards the three, yanked his brother, and started hauling ass in the opposite direction as Fletcher waved his hand a little in a comical way. Alphonse and Sora stared after, both very confused on what had just happened, then very slowly, Alphonse moved his head towards the way the older brother of Fletcher had came from and tilted Sora's head the same way he was looking because Sora was still staring after the fleeing brothers. Alphonse felt himself groan as his older brother came from the path and continued running and Riku was with him. Edward was cursing a beautiful profanity of curses, so beautiful that Alphonse had to cover Sora's ears just so they wouldn't have to be heard and stained later. Riku stopped when he saw Sora and Alphonse but Edward continued to chase after his imposter, continuing to scream the curses, hoping it would hinder the other in some way.

"So this is where you two were." Riku commented and saw the brown bag in Alphonse's hand, "You managed to get the medicine?" Riku asked, a slight smile on his face and Sora couldn't help but think that Riku was smiling because Edward was making a fool of himself. Riku was still...still what? Sora felt himself frowning as his mind stopped supplying him with the information needed to complete that sentence, but whatever it was, Sora thought, Riku was still it.

"Yeah, we were about to start heading back." Alphonse replied, standing up from the brick wall and Riku just shook his head. All three of them gazed off into the distance as they saw claps of alchemy fling into the air and Riku felt a great mood of exasperation from the younger Elric. "Niisan, why do you have to destroy at least one thing every where we go?" Alphonse then chased after the lights of alchemy, giving Riku the brown bag, and off to fix the streets that Edward had likely transmutated. The two stood there for a few moments, silence crafted itself in the wind and Riku just shook his head, almost laughing.

"Riku..." Riku shook his head again, this time letting a little giggle sneak its way out and he patted Sora on the head, noticing that he had been doing that a lot more lately.

"I'm fine, I'm fine." Riku reassured the brunet then grabbed the boy's human hand and started to lead him back to the quaint home that they had taken residence at the moment. Not one thought of malice or getting away from this place seemed to enter in Riku's mind.

--------------------------------

The dark-haired woman blinked at the news that she had received from the pathetic man just a few steps ahead of her. So since she was a little surprised, she asked out loud, "Someone already came and told you that we need the stone?" Her tone as seductive and low as ever but under the waves there was a hint of slight anger if the man decided to lie to her. Magwar flinched, remembering the night before.

"Yes, the one you call Envy, I believe." Lust rose a clear brow and frowned to herself. What was Envy thinking? Oh well, no matter. Lust then folded her arms underneath her cleavage and stared at the man,

"Now you were saying something about strange little black beings?" The doctor nodded, quite eagerly, thinking probably that Lust would provide protection.

"Yes, I thought you would know about them, they're strange little beings that come from the shadows, and if you try to hit them, it won't do anything. They've disappeared and reappeared all over the mansion." Lust furrowed her brows, trying to think of anything that could possibly match that description. The closest thing would have to be golems(1) but she was sure that they had taken care of that little pest.

"Hm, well, we'll make sure to watch out for that." Lust commented, just to reassure the man of his nightmares and to get more of a start on his pathetic version of alchemy to make the Philosopher's Stone. It was then Lust felt a disturbance in the air, a shaky feeling she hadn't ever felt (or remembered feeling). Something was other there, and it was much more powerful then her. Lust however regained her composure and kept silent as the pathetic human being seemed to nod and started listing off the mechanics of the stone and that it would be finished soon. Lust did not frown, but she felt that she should have, because that power was taunting and calling her all at the same time.

--------------------------------

Riku and Sora had made it back to the little house and both were a little confused as the man who owned the house was gone. But not letting that stop them, they entered in the house and woke the young girl up to take her medicine. Elisa stook her tongue out at Riku who glared right back at her and Sora laughed, joining the girl in childish merriment. Riku hit Sora on the head (inwardly hoping he didn't damage any more brain cells as Sora had started with a limited amount) and force-feed the girl her cold medicine. Riku then told the girl to go to sleep or he'd knock her out and Elisa giggled at the rough nature of the silver-haired boy as did Sora. Riku threatened her with a 'I'm serious' and Elisa just tugged the sheets and giggled beneath them, soon falling asleep. Sora grinned brightly and Riku just shook his head. Riku then stood up and Sora followed him cheerfully outside.

"We're going to practice alchemy Sora." Sora blinked at this and Riku frowned slightly. "The only reason we're practicing because it seems we're merging with the world's physics." Which made sense in Riku's mind because of the fact they had been there for awhile, usually Riku never went into a world for more then a day. So Riku supposed it was because of the world's way of magic that he couldn't perform it easily. At least, that's what he thought. Riku did not want to be wrong as it would have irritated him to a very bad point.

"R-Really?" Sora asked, the grin on his face blazing brightly and Riku nodded.

"First, we're going to practice drawing arrays, because we may never know when our powers will stop working." Like last night, Riku growled to himself but kept it to himself as to not alarm the other boy. Sora nodded and grabbed a stick to draw into the ground and Riku muttered to himself that they needed to get something that would write on all surfaces. Riku watched as Sora tried to draw an array and as for a first timer, it didn't look bad, but it definitely wouldn't suffice. Riku went next though, looking a little better then Sora's compound and tried to perform alchemy but the thing that popped out was definitely not magnificent and it was very small. Sora stared at the arrays and frowned deeply, holding up his hands as a desire to just clap everything instead of practice. Riku sighed and hit the boy's shoulder kindly to tell him to keep practicing with him. So the two sat on the dirt and practiced until their fingertips were sore and until the Elric brothers came back.

"Having fun?" Alphonse asked, watching as his older brother closed the door to the house loudly. Riku glared up at the armor, rubbing his coarse fingertips together to prove that he was not in the mood. Alphonse just shook his head and started to comment on how to make easier looking arrays, while having the same effect it should. It was weird, in a very nice way. Riku thought, they were just calmly discussing the physics of this world and it seemed to be a flighty mood, despite the fact that there were things going on that seemed to be beyond their grasp. It was extremely nice, Riku thought again to himself. But he definitely was getting too attached, they would leave soon anyway, as soon as possible...

"Plenty," Riku responded sarcastically, then looked at his new array and smiled slightly, clapping as he formed a new item made from the components in the fertile dirt to make a solid doll. Riku smirked victoriously as Sora did not do as good as a job as Riku did. Riku then narrowed his eyes as he felt something disturbing in the air as he could hear the heartless around his heart starting to come out and respond again. Only this time, in the few weeks that Riku had the heartless powers, the heartless had a feeling that Riku could never thought he would connect them with. Fear. Heartless with the emotion of fear? There was something incredibly disturbing here, but Riku didn't know what to think or do, so he didn't show any physical movement to show any distress but as long as he felt it, Riku knew something was amiss. Whatever it was though, it was a bit away, so there really was nothing to worry about.

"You're pretty good at alchemy Riku," Alphonse commented and looked over at Sora who had pouted quite angrily and Riku just nodded with a confident smirk. "Why are you practicing your arrays, though? I thought you can do transmutations without an array."

"Just in case," Riku replied back honestly, not knowing what else he should say to the other and the three looked up as Edward came back out, only this time he looked quite evil with a confident evil grin.

"…Ni-niisan?" Alphonse asked with a quiet hesitance. Edward looked over to his younger brother with the same confident evil grin,

"I've figured nearly everything out. Now all that needs to be done is easily done in one simple action." Edward continued to grin and the three stared quite blankly as Edward continued, "we sneak into the mansion again, only this time, we sneak in and scope out the mansion instead of charging in to those stupid imposters." Alphonse and Riku had to admit to themselves, they were shocked. Edward had managed to come up with a bonafide plan that did not involve blowing something up or maiming someone. It was very shocking, after knowing Edward for awhile, the kind of guy to rush in and charge in, the kind of guy who'd you expect to be the battle tank, had come up with the plan to sneak into the mansion. Riku then frowned for a moment,

"What do you mean you nearly have everything figured out?"

"Oh you'll see…you'll see." How is it that Edward had such a creepy tone and such a creepy grin? Riku actually found himself having an extreme hesitance toward the other teenager boy, and the heartless gratefully took that feeling over the feeling of fear that they had earlier. So soon night came and Riku blinked more then once as they sneaked into the mansion once again, only this time in a more incognito style and burrowed down into the earth. However before they realized it, all four of them fell further into the ground to reveal an underground hide-out that had red liquid pacing down further into said hide-out.

"What is this place?" Alphonse spoke out first, curious on why there would be an underground facility at all in the first place. Edward looked down at the red liquid and frowned,

"This is what's making everyone sick."

"What it?" Sora asked, blinking and carefully avoided being close to it, after hearing that it was what was making everybody sick up on the surface. Edward looked over at Sora as though expecting the boy to know then shook his head,

"It's red water." Riku's eyes widened and he couldn't help but ask the question,

"How is it making everyone sick?"

"The chemicals in it are potentially dangerous," Edward then covered his mouth with his sleeve a frown appearing upon his hiding face and he looked over to the other two breathing beings, "it'll be dangerous if we stay here too long. We've found what we need to know." Edward commented, as Riku and Alphonse helped Sora understand that the boy needed to cover his mouth.

"You shouldn't be down here." The group turned to face an angry faced blonde imposter, who continued to glare at the group and Edward glared back, showing that he would not back down in the power of ferocity.

"It's about time you give your identity, you bastard! You're one of the sons of Nash Tringham, aren't you? What you're doing here is meaningless and it's just poisoning the town!" Edward yelled at the other and the other seemed only momentarily shocked before running off in his own lecture.

"That's right, I am one of the Tringham's, my name is Russel, and you have no idea what you're talking about!"

"LIKE HELL I DON'T! This damned red water is just killing the village one by one! It's not worth this to make a Philosopher's Stone from the lives of all these people!" Edward yelled back, determined to not be swayed by the other's words. Russel growled and then took out a little stone. Riku and Sora did not recognize the stone but Edward seemed to recognize it for a second and frowned. "A red stone?"

"It's the closest thing to the Philosopher's Stone that we've made so far. We have to continue otherwise we'll never get close." Russel commented and Riku felt his heart quake as the heartless cried out in a passion. There were heartless building around, and they were forming themselves around the blonde boy with brown eyes. Riku found himself frowning and watched Sora grow determined in a way that told Riku that Sora was getting ready to fight. This was bad, if they got into a fight here, it was likely that there would be some explosions and Riku could only imagine what the red water would do if it got explosions with it. Riku frowned though as Edward clapped and formed his automail blade, however instead of charging in as Riku expected him too, Edward turned and ran the other way. It had only taken a few moments before everyone else was following after the bright-haired blonde. Riku thought inwardly that Edward was thinking the same things that Riku had been and was worried about getting anyone directly accidentally involved with the conflict.

Amazingly enough, they had made it back to the surface and they made it into a room full of plants and a wood-board. Edward turned and the boys ran behind him, getting into their own special combat mode. The strange thing was though, the heartless stopped forming from behind the imposter. Riku found himself growing confused but he knew there was no time to be questioning about the heartless when Russel took out his incomplete Philosopher's Stone and started firing off miscellaneous objects that Riku knew for sure that if it hit, it would hurt, it would hurt a lot. The group found themselves ducking and dodging the harder objects but they all paused as Russel clapped unto a pipe that had been connected on the outside of the wooden walls. As the pipe pulled out Russel gave a distinct frown. "Leave this town now."

"Feh, yeah right." Edward grinned but then noticed that the pipe that Russel transmutated had a strange design and had an open and close valve on top of it.

"This is connected to the red water below, if you get soaked in this, there's no doubt you'll die." Riku peered down to see that the pipe was indeed going below the wooden floors and Riku spared a glance over to Sora who seemed ready to jump at any moment. Though, knowing Sora, Riku thought, the boy would take a hit for anyone else before he'd just let them die on his time. Sora, you stupid idiot. There was a standoff and Riku could feel himself breathing uneasily. However he caught Edward's gaze and the two communicated with their eyes and started to formulate a plan, but then they all heard a door opening. Russel turned his head over and Riku took advantage of that, running up to the blonde and kicked the other right in the gut. Russel coughed at the pain as Edward clapped and ran to the wall to create another door for them to escape. So they had and once again found themselves into the little home that Vercio had owned. Riku found himself slightly reeling over the new information and Sora had to lay down to calm himself down as they had finally managed to be in a safe place. Riku wondered how they hadn't been mauled yet just because of this little housing.

"Ed, what are we going to do now?" Alphonse asked, not quite sure of what to do now. After all, they had discovered the basic information that was needed, but what were they all going to do? Was there going to be a point? Alphonse looked at his older brother as the other did not respond. Alphonse just saw his brother staring outside of the window and into the darkness. "Niisan?" Edward furrowed his gaze and looked over at Riku.

"Those things are out there again. They're mostly around the mansion though..." Those things? Those things? OH! Those things, the heartless. Riku peered over to the window and glared to barely see the shadows known as the heartless creeping and crawling around the town. Odd thing was they didn't enter in the havens known as people's homes. Riku found himself frowning, a lot of them were by the mansion indeed...in fact, there were far too much of them.

"Riku..." Sora anxiously seemed to twitch, a frown appearing on the boy's face. Riku sensed that as a way of telling him that there was a bigger heartless out there. A heartless that was controlling all the other small ones and that was because of a selfish greedy human out there somewhere. If Riku had to guess, it would be Magwar. Riku grimaced, there was no way they should go into battle with the hindrance known as Edward and Alphonse. The best Edward could do is get rid of the little heartless and he was lucky in that aspect because of the light that shined from alchemy made them god-fearing, but if there was going to be a large heartless...There was no way this battle could be easily won without any casualties. Riku then groaned and sighed heavily,

"Those things are heartless." Edward seemed to peek up at this, looking over at Riku with a speculative stare. Riku found himself frowning, he was just involving these two. This would be so troublesome, but Riku knew from spending a few weeks with Edward that the boy would charge in, even if he couldn't hit the damn things and truthfully, Riku did not want Edward to get hurt or die. Riku wasn't as worried about Alphonse though because the heart of Alphonse was probably harder to get to then it would be in their flesh beings.

"Go on..." Edward encouraged the silver-haired teenager, seeing that Riku wanted to say more. Riku continued to have a distinct frown and looked around, just to make sure there was no one else listening in.

"The heartless are beings made from people's hearts, most of them were corrupt and violent in their human life-times. However the heartless have only one instinct, and that's prey on other hearts and make more heartless." Riku could tell that Sora seemed to tense up on the subject but Riku knew that he couldn't stop, because Edward was absorbing this information like juice. Even if Edward looked a little skeptical about it. "These beings were created from darkness basically, and because they were made from human hearts, it's impossible to attack them unless you fight back with your own power of your own heart," in Riku's mind that sounded terribly chessily but he really had no other word for it. There was a pause of silence as Edward stared carefully and calculating at the other.

"How do you know this?" Edward asked cautiously, and Riku could feel that Edward didn't completely believe it but there were little things about the story that probably made sense in Edward's clock of a mind. Riku hesitated towards extracting that sort of information. He really did not want to tell someone he did not know extremely well that he was from another world, that and it would probably interfere with the world's order. Though, the fact was that Edward would not believe him, Riku still did not want to tell the truth. Especially since he was now, even if he didn't have complete loyalty to it, was part of the pact of the heartless.

"No offense, but I don't trust you well enough to tell you that information." Riku admitted and Edward seemed to coil a bit at those words, but he said nothing else. Edward then looked over to Sora, who was still extremely uncomfortable with the whole conversation.

"So that keyblade of his...it fights with the power of his heart?" Edward asked, of course raising an eyebrow in disbelief. Edward didn't believe it was 'heart' but simply that it was a different power. Edward didn't know what, but he was sure it was something else, however since he didn't know what it was, the only thing he could do was go with what Riku had said.

"..." Riku looked over at Sora who looked down slightly, as the boy refused to say anything that he didn't understand completely. "Sora's weapon is special." Riku admitted and Edward rose his other eyebrow in curiosity. "Before you ask, I don't truly know the full mechanics of the keyblade." Edward seemed to nod at this then looked back out and frowned. Riku followed his gaze and slightly faltered as he saw a giant heartless from the horizon stretching itself out from the mansion, breaking the roof and declared a red mist flowing above. Riku felt himself growing slightly terrified of the red mist. Somewhat, a knowledge popped in his mind _That was why I couldn't perform alchemy last night_. Riku growled and formed his blade out of mid-air, knowing that he wasn't going to be able to do much else when they got into battle. Alphonse jumped at that and Riku looked over at Alphonse, "You stay here, take care of Kairi..."

"What are you going to do?" Riku shrugged and saw Sora summon his Three Wishes keyblade out of mid-air, somewhat convincing Edward that the weapons were indeed something special. Something fought with 'heart'.

"What do I have to do to get my own weapon?" Riku looked over then looked over at Sora and blinked as Sora declared and Riku found it even more cheesy,

"Believe." Sora then ran out, slashing through many shadow heartless and jumping around to attack the flying heartless in a beautiful form of grace that should not have belonged to someone who had forgotten his entire life. Riku followed after, also cutting through the air as they all charged to prevent the red mist from spreading further. Edward growled and looked over Alphonse. Alphonse just nodded and Edward clapped his hands and placing them on the ground of the outside, grunting as he brought out his own version of a keyblade, hoping that it would work. Believe? What kind of crap was that? But Edward wasn't going to stand by and let two people he knew fight by themselves. Belief? Yeah, he'd believe, believe he could kick some heartless ass! Edward rushed forward with a keyblade that seemed like a spear edge at the end while it's handle was garnished in symbols that was broadcasted many arrays that represented fire, earth, energy, and wind and hanging from said keyblade was a little keychain that held the symbol that was on Edward's back.

--------------------------------

"Whoo!" Axel called out, staring over as they started to fall into the world. "That's one huge heartless!"

"Where the hell is...Ah! There!" Larxene pointed as they continued to fall in a normal calm pace. Demyx did not share this calmness and sighed anxiously.

"That's Sora?" Roxas asked, quite calmly, his head full of blonde spokes and his eyes a piercing calm blue. Axel looked over to Roxas, a little amused as Roxas seemed to be surveying the brunet boy that was running directly to the huge heartless.

"Why are we just letting ourselves fall? We know where we need to go, let's go!" Demyx whined to the other three and Larxene just scoffed.

"Oh fine, you big baby." She held up her hand and disappeared in a mist of dark colors and the other three males followed after and the group of four blended into the crowd of darkness with their dark cloaks. Larxene peeked around though, coughing slightly as she stared at the red mist. "What the hell is that?" Demyx wondered if she only got a foul mouth because she was away from the piercing stare of their superior (who had very oddly did not like curses).

"No idea, but they're running towards it." Axel clearly pointed and watched as Roxas stared up at the heartless that started to stretch out its odd wings placed on the side of its ears. It did look like a very weird heartless, Axel mused in his mind, not thinking much else.

"When Sora defeats that thing, it'll be a big help, right?" Demyx asked, remembering that little detail about Sora's keyblade.

"Well normally...but remember, Xenmas said that the hearts haven't been traveling to Kingdom Hearts." Larxene commented back, giving a slight stern glare to the not so happy to be here Demyx. "We're here to find out why."

"Thanks for stating the obvious."

"I can't help that some blondes are more stupid then others."

"Are you saying something about Roxas?"

"If I was?"

"Larxene..." Axel warned the blonde who just laughed cheerfully, ignoring the threatening tones of the redhead. It was really hard to be scared by the redhead when he was in this protective mood anyway.

"Quiet." Roxas commented and everyone silenced immediately to listen to the air. Larxene frowned, not hearing anything and so did Axel but he wasn't as mad at Roxas as Larxene was. Demyx on the other hand seemed to hear whatever Roxas heard,

"What is that?" Demyx asked, just in case Roxas knew. Roxas simply shook his head and glared to the beyond surroundings of where Sora had finally managed to get to where he needed to be. Hm, this should probably be interesting.

--------------------------------

They had reached all the way up to the mansion, and now that they were closer, Riku kind of admitted that he regretted getting so close. It was a giant and was a dark red with strange looking wings flying from its ears and it's eyes were that of a normal heartless but he was caked in a red cloak and seemed to be spitting out red rocks.

"Sora! Try and find the weak point, if you find it, holler? Ready?" Riku yelled at the brunet who nodded in slight confusion as he slowly processed what a weak point was. Riku then jumped away as the heartless spotted the two and spat out two huge red rocks that penetrated the ground and started to melt immediately, killing the earth around it. This was bad, Riku admitted to himself, he may had not liked the villagers that much but if they ever hoped to make a living, they would have to have at least some fertile ground. A loud clap of light interrupted his thoughts as he saw Edward making the shadow heartless disappear with the frightening light of alchemy but when Riku saw Edward with a keyblade, Riku grew immediately confused. Edward bypassed Riku of course, dodging any random red stones that started to fall from the spitting heartless boss and started to slash at the bare feet of said heartless. The mansion was gone basically, so it wasn't hard to find cover between the miscellaneous piles that used to be the mansion.

"RIKU!" Sora shouted and Riku peered around to try and find the boy but failed and Riku growled. Sora kept calling out for him, so where was his voice coming from? Riku then looked up and gaped as Sora had managed to make his way up somehow and was slashing at the heartless's winged head. It would flinch and yell and scream more red rocks whenever Sora hit it, so all they had to do is get up like Sora had. Soon the heartless though (who Riku had privately named Crimson Red)(Riku did not realize that his naming sense was lame at the time) whipped out one of his huge hands and grabbed Sora. Riku growled as Sora was captured by said hand and started to get squeezed. Sora squeaked and Edward clapped, making the light of alchemy appear underneath the heartless in a huge array that nearly blinded Riku from looking directly at it. Crimson Red yelled and Riku quickly scanned the boss, seeing that it was still far from being taken down. Riku looked around and tried to think but it was not being pieced together as Sora bit Crimson Red on his thumb.

The heartless apparently did not like this and yowled more catastrophic shaped red stones. Riku frowned and had to jump as one of those stones reached his hiding spot. Edward had said that this was a catalyst, right? Riku made an array in the less then fertile sand and placed one had on the huge catalyst. Riku pointed up at Crimson Red with his blade and forced the array on the ground to activate. The effect was devastating. A fireball the size of a planet fired out from the tip of his sword and flew straight to where Riku had directed his aim, barely missing Sora. Yowls pierced the sky and shook the heavens as the giant threw both his hands to his scarring burning face and Sora dropped from the air at an alarming rate. However before he could completely fall, a hand of a tree caught him and Sora grunted as he softly fell to the ground. Riku allowed himself to gaze who had managed to make that tree extends its limbs to help Sora and saw the youngest of the Tringham brother's. Riku nodded simply and Fletcher helped out Sora by helping the boy up.

Edward continued trying his alchemic light and it did do damage but it wasn't doing all that Riku hoped it would. They needed to find the source, because there was something that was supplying an endless supply of healing towards the heartless. Riku had no idea what to do, he had never fought against a heartless that kept healing. So he did the best thing he could think up, he gathered himself to be with Sora and Fletcher.

"Where did this thing come from?" The boy shook his head anxiously, a deep sad frown forming on his mouth.

"I don't know, brother and I were in a prison cell when it came out." A prison cell? Why would they be? Ah well, it didn't matter right now, Riku had to find a way to get this battle over with. Edward didn't seem to notice that he was gone for the moment and Riku frowned. Could have this heartless came from the oh so infamous Dr. Magwar? Probably, and the thing that was probably supplying Crimson Rose with so much health was probably the red river underneath the ground. Riku then looked beyond the giant and saw a huge hole that he didn't care to notice before.

"Help Ed, I'll go take care of the source." Riku communicated to both of the boys, who both nodded willfully and Fletcher started to draw an array that Riku didn't know on the tree that had caught Sora earlier while Riku charged to jump down the huge hole that would led underground. Riku took a deep breath and took out a piece of chalk that Alphonse had given to him earlier when they had been practicing. Riku then drew an array he hoped was correct and shouted, "AERO!" A force of wind shocked Riku as it flew all around him as he quickly landed into the red water. Knowing that this type of Aero wouldn't work long, Riku took a flip and landed on the solid ground that had rocks trying to stumble his landing. Riku then covered his mouth, going downwards and once again hoping he assumed right. Riku had never placed much faith in hope as he did before, but this was common sense in Riku's mind and the heartless seemed to be cooing in the back of his mind that he was getting close to a source of great power. Was this the power of the greed of people in this world? Riku shuddered to think who could bring out an even more powerful heartless.

Eventually Riku managed to get to where he needed to be and he shuddered as he looked at a slightly overly big man seemed to be pulsating with heartless power, being consumed by it. Riku growled and looked around to see the Russel had fainted upon the ground and looked almost dangerously soaked with the red water. Riku then took his chalk once again and drew another fire array, this time it was not as dangerous as the fireball he had casted earlier but it did what Riku needed it to do. It caught Magwar's attention.

"Who the hell are you?"

"Who are you to ask?" Riku haughtily replied back, finding himself on the edge of his toes to prepare for any sudden movements that would need to be done. Magwar seemed to Riku for a moment but then started laughing. Riku simply stared blankly, his gaze lingering to see that the red water was starting to rise...that definitely couldn't be good. Riku then drew out his blade and taunted the man. Magwar simply summoned simple shadow and air soldiers, which Riku took care of easily enough with a few hits to his body but not enough to fatigue the boy as he managed to charge closer to the controller. All Magwar saw before Riku slashed at him was an almost evil eye and blood encompassed his vision after Riku got a direct attack to his face. Riku felt no feelings of remorse but only of that of an assassin to stop the enemy attack. Magwar gargled up blood and found that his body failing and he fell to the ground encompassed by the pain that had overwhelmed him. Riku then looked over at Russel and frowned as he felt that he couldn't leave him just lying there, even if the guy had threatened them earlier.

Riku grunted as he lifted the somewhat stable boy and Riku felt his very blood freeze as he watched the red water slowly rising. Riku felt himself struggling and running to where the huge hole that he had jumped down earlier. "HEY! CAN ANYONE HEAR ME UP THERE!?"

"Little busy here Riku!" Edward called back and Riku growled.

"Well the water down here is rising! But don't worry about me, I'll be fine!" Riku's voice laced with sarcasm and Edward growled back. Riku then jumped back as Crimson Red's large foot crashed through the hole. Riku wondered for a moment if Edward had purposely managed to irritate the heartless just so that Riku could struggle upon it. Crimson Red reacted quickly as Riku stepped unto the large foot and Riku looked up to see that the heartless was much more hurt. Riku started to feel more confident and jumped off the foot, running to hide behind a large wall that remained of the entire mansion. Riku took that time to speculate his surroundings and watched as trees rose to cover the entire area and start soaking the bad effects of the red water.

"Riku!" Sora cheered happily and Riku couldn't help but found himself smiling. Sora waved then became more serious and started to slash and jump. Crimson Red started to fall and Russel started to stir. As the heartless got delivered a final blow by the combined efforts of Sora's keyblade and Edward's alchemic light and it started to fall but before the complete fall it turned into a heart. They all stared then Riku remembered about the red water,

"We have to get out of here! The red water's rising higher!"

"What? What happened to Magwar?" Edward asked, heaving a loud sigh as he had performed the array and tried to perform slashes to that creature for more then he thought he would have to.

"He's gone." Riku replied simply and looked at the wall that surrounded them. "We should get going."

"Right." Fletcher nodded and they went forward to the wall, running and Fletcher placed one wall down as the red river slowly started crawling up. As they exited, Fletcher put the tree back up and they escaped. But before they completely ran back into town, Fletcher and Russel stood over all the trees and they seemed to share a brother moment and all the red water was gone as well as the trees in what seemed to be in an instant.

"Pretty." Sora noted and the group looked up to see what seemed to be slight red snow but it was something to help the land. At least, that's what Riku felt, and he felt himself growing extremely stronger because they had defeated Crimson Red and the heartless in his mind loved that strength and Riku felt extremely better for it. It wasn't much longer when the whole town calmed down and rebuilding started, and they were back on the train, this time to travel to the eastern headquarters.

"It was nice meeting you all." Fletcher said from below the windows the four sat at.

"Feh, I guess it wasn't bad to meet you." Edward scoffed then blinked as Elisa offered a basket of lemons with a happy grin and she was looking much better.

"Thank you Mr. Elric! Sorry about being mean to you." Edward just gave a slight sigh and shrugged. Alphonse laughed slightly and took the basket while Riku glared over at Russel.

"...Thanks." The boy admitted rather unpridely and Edward grinned rather viscously as Russel had given into his lack of pride and Edward felt extremely accomplished for it.

"No problem." Edward gave the evil grin that Riku found himself slightly afraid of and Riku turned his face to ignore it completely.

"You'll come back to visit, right?" Elisa asked, a grin upon her pretty little face and Sora waved to that little face.

"We'll try." Alphonse answered honestly but Edward scoffed slightly as did Riku but it didn't bother the younger one's one bit. The train started to move and the group found themselves waving at the village when Edward blinked as he found a letter in the basket of lemons. After a few moments of reading, Edward paled deeply and Riku found himself laughing incredibly hard. "Niisan, what was on the letter?"

"Nothing!" Edward squeaked as Riku continued to laugh harder. This only encouraged Alphonse to chase after it and watching an armor set chase after a considerable shorter figure in the booth seat was quite funny. Riku kept laughing until Alphonse read off the line that had been in the letter,

"I guess you being a year older then me would help you with that kind of wisdom." Alphonse and Sora joined in Riku's laughter as Edward groaned loudly,

"A year younger and he's still so much taller then me!"

--------------------------------

Boredom flashed through the poles of shadow that would occur through the windows every time they passed a pole on the train. Riku and Sora were amused in their own booth as they studied over the alchemy book, understanding more and Riku helped Sora with the boy's speaking disability. Edward and Alphonse on the other hand were bored as they had been playing the same card game for the last few hours, and worse, Edward kept winning. Riku had tried to think of what had happened in Xenotime but did not exactly get what the red water had done to his nature abilities to hinder them, but he didn't really want to think of the troublesome thing. Riku then glanced over at Kairi who had her own little booth to sleep in and he sighed simply, not knowing what else to do. Sora seemed to sense the distress and Riku just patted the boy on the head.

"How are we doing on time?" Riku asked out loud to get an answer from the blonde boy ahead of him and Sora flipped the page of the alchemic book to stare at the arrays.

"One or two more stops and we'll be there," Edward responded with slight irritability and Riku really didn't blame the other. Trains lost their merit when you rode them quite often and the time to travel to one place to the other got quite irritating. So when they had stopped and watched people come and go into the other cart, it wasn't very interesting. At least until a group of four that made Riku's heart clench because the heartless held unto it as though it was the life support.

"Hey there, are you using this seat?" A pretty blonde with strange antennae hair asked, she was wearing a pretty dress that tugged all around her tall yet curvy body. The girl smiled rather charmingly and Riku couldn't quite understand it, but he knew there was something different about the girl. Then there was the other three with her. They were dressed rather normally for a group of boys, but Riku could feel himself staring at the red-head with a strange look of comprehension that shouldn't have been there, and there was one who seemed nervous to even be in the cart but made no movement besides a slight twitch to his fingers. But the one that stood out in Riku's mind was the spiky haired blonde that had a look of quiet solumnitude upon his face. Riku didn't know why, but he stood out from the others.

"Huh? No, not really." Edward responded, throwing a card down and picking up another. Larxene grinned and sat next to the blonde boy, who ignored the woman as Demyx sat next to Alphonse staring at the card game. That left the redhead and blonde boy to sit next to the other two. They sat across from the other two and Riku felt himself tense even more. These strangers were bad news, at least that's what Riku thought but when Sora gave a bright grin to the two strangers, Riku couldn't help but somewhat think that he might have been wrong. One look at the red-head who gave a confident smirk to the other and Riku thought, no, no there was no _way_ he was wrong. However Sora stared to speak to the boy that was across from him and even though his sentences were choppy and kind of hard to understand, the boy seemed to listen with a soft intent.

"Oh! Sora!" Sora introduced himself, clapping on his chest and grinning.

"Roxas." The boy gave his name in reply, though seemed to want to remain silent otherwise.

"I'm Axel," Axel responded to continue the getting to know each other moments.

"Riku." Riku let his name go only because he did not want to seem suspicious.

"I'm Larxene!" The blonde girl interrupted, climbing over the booth and plumbing her caboose between the two boys that had given up their names. "Nice to meet you." Larxene's voice couldn't be described scratchy, but it was something like that. Whatever it was, it made Riku slightly cringe because he was suspicious of her and for all he knew, she could have been the mastermind. "What about you guys?" She asked honestly, in her mind she was wondering why these two seemed to be traveling with these other two.

"I'm Alphonse," The boy in the armor replied, though sighed as Edward had won another card game.

"I'm Ed." Edward didn't feel like addressing his full name so he didn't proclaim it and started to shuffle the pack of cards.

"I'm Demyx," the last one said, as he had not said anything before and he did not want to interrupt anybody during their own introductions. There was a bit of silence before Larxene slightly bluntly asked,

"Why do you suck at talking so much?" Honestly, this was the keyblade wielder? I guess they were right when they said that just about any idiot can wield a weapon. Larxene blinked though when Riku gave her a harsh glare, daring her to say more about Sora's talking. Larxene kind of found it funny because it reminded her of Axel's possessive protective nature of Roxas (even if the other one didn't need it half of the time). It was amusing slightly, so when Riku replied, she found herself even more amused,

"He had a bump to the head and doesn't remember much, you have a problem with that?"

"Nope, nope." Larxene replied back happily, feeling something she was sure she hadn't felt in a long time. So was this what it felt like to have emotions? Larxene found herself hungering it to be amused even more.

"Hey, Larxene, you mind?" Axel gave her the clearly annoyed tone and Larxene simply let her arms wander to both of her companion's shoulders with a smirk.

"Oh I don't mind at all." Axel glared at her, not knowing what else to do and Demyx couldn't help but feel slightly lonely as the rest of his companions kept where they were and talking to the keyblade wielder and his so called protector. Demyx didn't understand it at first, but Larxene had (rudely) explained it that when the heart of the heartless tried to drift above to Kingdom Hearts she saw clearly black hands that simply dragged it down to the earth's core and disappeared out of nowhere. Larxene wasn't exactly sure what they saw so they she decided that they would tail the heroes to see if they knew any better. Demyx did understand that it was highly probable that their leader would get angry soon if they didn't report back but Larxene had scoffed off that warning and managed to get them on the train ride and riding with the group.

"So where are you all heading?" Alphonse asked curiously, glad that he could talk to someone instead of having his older brother beat him in the card game again.

"The East City," Larxene replied easily, this time looking over from up the booth seat and over to Alphonse.

"Really, that's a coincidence, so are we." Alphonse replied cheerfully and Riku felt himself paling as he could hear from Alphonse's tone that the boy was already in an extreme liking to the girl. Riku swore, he would never see what Alphonse had in delight for women, then again, maybe Alphonse had a thing for blondes? Riku didn't know, he hadn't been with the two long enough for that kind of knowledge either. So the train ride continued and there really was nothing much else to say except that Riku let himself talk and continue talk to all of them, Larxene talked the most of all of them and surprisingly beat Edward in a game of cards and Demyx pointed out that Edward had some cards falling from his sleeve. Edward soon after got chased and yelled at by his younger brother. When they finally made it, the groups separated and Riku followed the reluctant Edward.

"So we're going to meet your boss then, finally?" Edward glared over at Riku with a horrible twitch and Riku felt his mouth twitch a bit trying not to smile.

"Yeah, and then I can get rid of you too." Edward grinned evilly, laughing almost maniacally and Riku looked up as it started to darken a bit to show that it could rain soon.

"Ed...really want to get rid of us?" Sora asked, his puppy eyes shining brightly and Edward stared blankly. The boy sighed then looked away, not knowing how to face the poor puppy-eyed boy.

"Yeah, Ed, you don't really want to get rid of Sora so quickly, do you?" Edward gave a sharp glare to his younger brother then marched on ignoring the jeers he got from the three. It had started raining officially when they managed to make it to the office headquarters and Edward stared at the iron gates with depression.

"He isn't that bad, is he?" Riku asked, staring at how sad and angry the oldest Elric continued to look. Alphonse peered over to his brother and sighed,

"_I_ don't think he is, but niisan always likes to exaggerate."

"There's nothing to exaggerate! That stupid man and his know-it-all shit-ass attitude! Then he'll look and he'll be like 'Oh hello hagane no, destroyed a few cities I see, and still no discovery of any clue of the Philosopher's Stone, huh? Oh where did Edo-kun go? Oh there he is! I didn't see him beneath my desk because he's such a bean!'" Edward shouted with anger, holding his head and twisting his body around in anger at the thought of facing his so-called superior.

"Niisan..." Alphonse just said and Edward heaved another heavy sigh,

"May as well get it over with." Edward heaved another sigh and Edward went through the gates and Riku and Sora followed him. Alphonse took a bit but he entered in when they got into the building for the military. Riku peered around as Edward led them to a waiting room and walked into the room that presumably belonged to his superior as Edward forced himself to be dragged in there.

"Ed really not like Roy, huh?" Roy? Oh that's right, Riku remembered that Edward's superior's name was indeed Roy Mustang. Riku was getting incredibly curious about the man and he stood up to look around to see if there was any information lying around about anything for space travel. Riku kept forgetting that was what he was out here for.

"Right."

"Good evening." Riku blinked and looked to his side as a woman walked in. She seemed young for a woman but also had the look of being wise beyond her years and a look that seemed stern and disciplined look.

"Good evening Ms. Hawkeye." Alphonse replied, with a smiling tone behind his helmet. The woman named Hawkeye seemed to give a soft quick smile towards the boy and then looked over at the other two.

"Who are these two?"

"These are our new friends, Sora and Riku." The blonde hair woman with her hair pinned up took another quick look at the two then just nodded and Riku found himself feeling very relieved, as though he made a good friend in return of not looking like the wrong crowd. Sora grinned and waved his hands towards the woman and Riku found himself thinking that it growing slightly troublesome of Sora to be granting everyone his smile.

"I'm Sora!" Though from that sentence, Riku felt himself smiling despite himself because it sounded like Sora's regular voice, and that made Riku feel a little better.

"It's nice to meet you Sora. If you feel so inclined, you may call me Riza." Sora seemed to pause at that sentence, not quite sure what the woman had just said, but got the general idea when Riza had said her name.

"Okay!" Riku felt that Sora was trying to seem a little smarter around this woman, then again, she did have that type of stance that made you want to look smarter so you just wouldn't go down on her list of respect.

"Hawkeye, we have a little trouble over here." Peeked a head from the door, hair was a dirty blonde and a toothpick seemed attached to his mouth. Riza Hawkeye rose an eyebrow and gently asked,

"What seems to be the problem?"

"Breda's on top of the ceiling proclaiming something about a man eating creature in the office." Riza blinked then sighed and then walked off to where the blonde needed to escort her after saying that she'll be back. It was then there was an angry shout from the room Edward had went in and Riku couldn't help but be a little shaken because of the loud ranting cursing muffled noises he could hear from the room.

"...He...really hates him, doesn't he?"

"I think niisan just likes to exaggerate."

"Why would he _like_ to do that?" Riku asked, and Sora turned to Alphonse with the same question. Alphonse just shrugged slightly, not sure of the answer because it was just something his brother had been born with.

"Maybe Ed like Roy, really!" Alphonse paused at Sora's cut sentence and the armor started to snicker at the thought. Sora grew confused by this and Riku stared at Sora.

"What would make you think that Sora?"

"Cause we ex-ex-exa-exaggerate things too!" Riku rose a thin brow, comprehending what the boy could possibly mean but it didn't come so he asked,

"What do you mean Sora?"

"Papou fruits!" Sora answered and Riku found himself blinking blankly. Did Sora remember the little teasing that he had done to Sora with the papou fruits back at home? Riku felt glad that Sora was starting to remember things from the past, but it was also kind of bad in his mind. If Sora remembered they had betrayed each other, there would be some awkwardness between the two, and Riku was sure that Sora would do something stupid and outrageous.

"Papou fruits?" Alphonse asked and Riku just laughed slightly, explaining to Alphonse that it was a fruit back at their home and that they loved to tease each other over the fruit's legend. The talking stopped when Edward's yells came out of nowhere once again only this time Edward opened the door from the office, his eyes blazing with fury and his face dark with a blush. "Hey niisan."

"Not now Al." Edward shot a glance over to Riku, and Riku couldn't help but think he met the wild bore before it ate its food. "That bastard taisa would like to speak to you."

"Me? Why?" Riku blinked honestly, not expecting to hear that.

"...He wants to know more about the heartless." Edward commented then moved on, his mood returning to its sore, sour, outrighteously pissed mood. Alphonse followed after his brother of course, the armor boy sighing and Sora simply followed Riku into the office of Roy Mustang. It was needless to say, Roy Mustang was not the kind of person Riku had expected. Roy Mustang was definitely a character of charisma and he used his words to broadcast to pretend he did know everything. Then again, if Roy Mustang was predicting every move that Edward Elric would make, it wasn't really that hard.

"You wanted to see me?" Riku asked, though he felt himself tensing because of the fact that he knew that this man was a military man. Military men knew more death then he did and Riku only killed those who were evil, military men killed whoever was the enemy. Roy Mustang had dark hair and just as dark blue eyes, and his gaze was narrowed with the fact that he had battled over the ages.

"Your name is Riku, right?" Roy Mustang's voice was smooth and careful, Riku could see how Edward found himself hating the older man. Riku felt like he didn't very much like the man as well.

"That's right." Roy then looked over to Sora who seemed to be happy of meeting the person that Sora thought that Edward actually liked. Roy Mustang's composure seemed to change quite a bit when he looked over at Sora with a light smirk/smile,

"And you are Sora, are you not?" Sora grinned and nodded at this. Riku felt himself growing even more annoyed and very much wished that Roy would be buried, soon. Roy then looked over at the more knowledgeable of the two, "These heartless that hagane no has reported to me about, he says that you know more about it then he does."

"If Ed reported you that, then you should know what I told him." Roy nodded but he narrowed his eye's a little further and Riku found Sora getting a little closer to Riku in fear that the man might do something to the silver-haired young one. Roy then asked, his tone clear and soft but completely stern.

"You have nothing to do with bringing these things here, do you?" Riku blinked at those words. Did he? Riku didn't think so, but if he thought about it, every world that Sora and/or Riku would go to, heartless would appear in natural instinct to try and steal the keyblade. However there were heartless appearing to other worlds long before Sora or Riku got there, so the heartless in this world?

"No sir, I do not believe so." And Riku truly believed that because he saw the power of just one greedy person, if there were more just like him out there, then it was entirely their fault. Of course Riku slightly knew he was running away from the accusation, but would not let anything else be said. Roy studied Riku's composure for a second and nodded the boy off,

"Very well, now might you explain what hagane no means when you have to fight with your heart?" Riku didn't want to, because if this place was a military based world, then this would mean that this was one side and there would be another side. Riku preferred if both sides got gobbled up, but Sora grinned at this, as though being an expert in it for years.

"Heart means believe!" Sora started, demonstrating as he clapped out his keyblade and Riku seemed pleased that Sora didn't get the ease of summoning his keyblade anymore. Of course he was only pleased because he had been a little jealous, and Riku would never admit, but he thought himself stupid to be so jealous. Roy stared at the keyblade with a speculative look, a look that Riku had seen on Edward many times during the train rides. "When you fight with heart, you fight to save! Fight to let hearts go home." Riku turned over to Sora with this little bit of information and Riku grew confused immediately because he didn't think that Sora would say that. Save hearts? How did fighting with your heart help saved the hearts that had disappeared because of humanity's mistake for want and power and greed? Roy seemed a little confused about this too, so Sora continued, "To save. To believe. To fight heart and with heart!" Sora swung the weapon around clearly showing his new founding skill with it, a smile brimming on the boy's face and Riku couldn't help but think the boy was up to something else. However Riku knew that couldn't have been possible because Sora was never that deep of a thinker, even when he tried.

"In short, that's what I basically meant." Riku finished dully, not knowing what else to add and Riku supposed that explained it the best. Roy seemed to nod slowly then looked over at Sora curiously,

"Would I need one of those," he gingerly pointed to Sora's keyblade with a gloved military hand, "if a heartless came up to me?" Riku had no doubt that damn heartless would come up and eat Roy Mustang's heart greedily, but really, maybe Riku was biased. As he was seeing everything that Edward said was coming true in front of his eyes, this guy was a bastard.

"No." Sora replied honestly, this time grinning again and letting the man know that he just needed belief. Riku sighed to himself, that kind of thing was troublesome and cheesy, but it wasn't like anyone could do anything about it really. Because it was the truth, and it was the only way to describe fighting over the heartless. Roy sighed and then nodded then blinked as Riza Hawkeye entered in the room with a slightly amused look.

"Hawkeye?" Roy asked and Riza gave the man a piece of paper. Roy stared at it for a few seconds then blanked out, "What is this?"

"An issued challenge from Edward Elric." Roy rose his slender brow then sighed heavily, placing it down on the desk.

"I'll talk to hagane no about this later."

"Of course." Riza nodded simply then turned to Roy's guest and smiled over at Sora, "Are you hungry?" Sora blinked and nodded in a big way. Riku's stomach growled as he realized it had been awhile since he last ate (the train offered food but it was expensive and not in Riku's own personal taste). "Very well, are you finished with these boys, sir?" Roy nodded and banished them with a shoo motion with his hand. Sora gave a childish grin and grabbed a hold of Riza Hawkeye's hand happily. Riku blinked, did this woman remind Sora somewhat of his mother? Then again, Sora's mother was very stern and soft when she wanted to be, so I guess any woman would do but this was really the first woman that the two had came along since they started on this world. Riza Hawkeye did not mind and led the two towards the cafeteria and Sora almost drooled visibly at the food drifting to his senses. "I'll go get you two some seats, please go get your choice of food." Riku nodded and found that Sora followed that piece of advice immediately. Riku felt himself smiling despite himself, Sora could be cute when he wanted to be.

Riku gathered foods he liked and was shocked that he didn't have to pay as the cashier had been told that the food would go towards Edward's account. Riku wondered briefly if Sora had enough money for the blank hole known as Sora's stomach, but he kept to himself and peered over the mindless crowds of alchemists and military men. Riza Hawkeye beckoned the boys over to where she was and Riku sat down next to Edward while Sora sat opposite. Edward grunted slightly, looking in a sore mood.

"Something happen?" Riku asked, biting into a sandwich as Riza had disappeared from the table. Edward looked over at Riku and sighed honestly,

"Alphonse wanted to keep a cat he found in the rain. I said no, and he ran off with his full plate open." Riku could hear a soft regretful tone in Edward's voice because the boy probably didn't want to hurt his younger brother, but they really couldn't keep a cat, right? Riku knew that if they were traveling and had no permanent residence, it would be hard on the poor animal that would grow attach to the owners. Poor miserable impressionable beasts.

"Well I was talking about the challenge you issued to your boss, but I guess that would explain your sore mood."

"Kairi...okay?" Sora asked hesitantly, not wanting any harm to fall upon the girl. Edward looked away for a second but replied,

"Yeah, she fell out and I caught her, she's resting in one of the dorms here." Riku gave Edward a fierce glare and Edward fixed that quickly with the statement, "It's okay, only me and taisa have a key to that dorm." Why would Edward's hated boss have the same key? Oh well, Riku felt reassured and better knowing Kairi was finally resting back in a bed instead of an uncomfortable up position. Riku could already hear her bitching when she woke up and every one of her joints would pop. Riku couldn't help it, to himself it was a funny sight in his mind because when Kairi truly whined about something, it was just...funny.

"So about that issued fight?"

"Eh, I don't feel like giving the details yet." So in truth, Edward knew nothing about what he was going to do. Riku found his eyes rolling despite himself but he did nothing but continue eating.

"Is Alphonse going to come back eventually?"

"If eventually translates when he thinks I need help, yeah, he'll be back." Edward sorely said and Riku learned then that Edward did not like being far away from his brother. For any reason, and he slightly understood, after all, Riku never liked being too far away from his friends but he would do so if he needed to.

"Edo..." Sora started then looked around, seeing watches hanging from military pockets then looking around some more, "Why so many people?" Edward blinked at that question and shrugged,

"I have no idea, I think most of these guys are Central alchemist, here for renditions that was happening over at there 'quarters." Riku nodded at this, but to himself it made no clear sense but he wouldn't let that show. Riku peered around and looked at all the faces of the state alchemists.

"What do you have to do to become a state alchemist?"

"Pass their test." Test? Well that would make sense, so that would have to mean all of these alchemist would competent in one way or another. Riku wondered if they could all perform the same alchemy that Edward could.

"Oh I see."

"Also that challenge, it's going to help me keep being a state alchemist." Riku turned his head towards the blonde alchemist and tried to comprehend exactly what the boy said.

"Help you stay a state alchemist?"

"Uh-huh, I have to go through some messy work to show that I'm still worthy of being a state alchemist, but because I don't want to deal with that, I decided a fight against that bastard would show my abilities." Riku nodded at this and saw Sora looking pale at the thought of Edward's huge evil grin.

"Ed, why ex...ex..." Sora paused, trying to remember the word, "exaggerate?" Edward twitched and opened his mouth,

"Who told you I exaggerate?" Sora opened his mouth but there was a frightening sound and the group looked over and there was some miscellaneous screaming.

"Oh but you HAVE to see her! Elysia is just the most adorable thing on this earth! See, see, she's wearing this beautiful and cute bathing suit!" Riku wondered what that noise was, but he definitely did not want to stick around if it was making people scream.

"Oh no." Edward groaned and hid his face behind his automail arm and the source of that voice came up to Edward with a bright grin.

"Hello Ed!" The man had a very likable face and stance, but Riku found himself shaking in the back of his spine for some reason, "have you seen Elysia?" The man flashed a few pictures of a cute little girl who was hugging a huge teddy-bear, "Isn't she just the most adorable thing?"

"Hughes..." Edward started, "YOU SHOWED ME THAT PICTURE FIFTEEN TIMES SINCE I GOT HERE!" Edward yelled, and many a soldier applauded Edward's bravery of yelling at the happy father. Hughes was not taken back then looked at the picture,

"Oh really?" He banished the thought easily then brought out another picture, "How about this one?" Hughes got what Riku would like to call a coddling look on his face and showed Edward his newest picture. This time the girl was in a giant sun-hat that was presumably her mother's.

"I've seen that one too, Hughes, please just leave me alone."

"What about you, have you seen Elysia?" Riku felt himself jumping slightly, in slight fear of getting caught into the gale of this man's photography. Riku opened his mouth to lie but Sora and his damned childish mouth answered,

"No!" Hughes seemed to adore this and went into a showing rant. Riku would have to hit Sora very hard on the head when they got out of this.

--------------------------------

"This world is weird." Larxene said immediately, moving sunglasses around on the situation of her face.

"What are we doing just lingering here?" Roxas asked, his eyes dully staring at the other more brightly faced blonde. The girl blinked through her shades and looked around,

"Why? Not enjoying yourself?"

"Hardly."

"Demyx is enjoying himself."

"You lie horribly."

"Well Axel likes it down here."

"Axel's an idiot." Larxene couldn't help it, she giggled at Roxas plain and dull tone. Apparently the boy didn't enjoy being in the mortal realm. Larxene didn't see why though, she rather liked it. Humans were amusing pawns and the heartless were slowly creeping their way around to make this another new home. "Where is that idiot anyway?" Roxas asked, looking around.

"Roxas," Roxas felt himself holding back a grown but he turned around to see Axel actually grinning. Larxene's happy nature had got to the hothead and Roxas stared and looked over at Larxene.

"You didn't put him that, did you?

"Well he had the hair to match the color."

"Doesn't it look good on me though Roxas?"

"Axel..."

"Yes?"

"Get out of that dress."

--------------------------------

It was finally the day that the challenge had been issued on the date that was on the challenge letter. Roy Mustang looked very much like he didn't want to be there and Edward looked very happy to the fact that he was going to beat the crap out of that stupid smirking face!

"Ed..." Riku couldn't help but groan as Edward continued to grin. The boy was truly happy over the fact that he was going to be fighting this man? Riku heard the whispers among the other soldiers and alchemist that Roy Mustang could be a force to reckon with when he wanted to be.

"Go Ed!" Sora yelled cheerfully, cheering the boy on. Riku remembered hearing Roy said that they weren't going to have to do this fight but a man called the fuhrer (who Riku got more weird heartless clenching feelings around) said it would be all fine and dandy to watch a battle. After Hughes's sickening display of his daughter and almost being killed Hughes announced the start of the battle. While running away rapidly, because, despite his super father powers, he was still a normal person.

"Huh?"

"To slow!" And Roy Mustang snapped his fingers. Riku watched as the man demonstrated control over the fire arts that had surpassed spells up in space, he would give Maleficent shame on how well he controlled the fire arts. Riku witnessed all three of the fires that had been named as spells all snapping after Edward and unbelievably, Edward managed to dodge most of them. Of course when he jumped into the crowd, Roy Mustang seemed annoyed. "Well I can't kill you all, it'd be a terrible mess to clean up." Riku somehow got the feeling that Roy was joking but it still scared the alchemists that he had been around. "Ah well, this wouldn't be so hard if he wasn't such a little bean."

"WHO ARE YOU CALLING SO SMALL YOU CAN EAT!?" Roy Mustang smirked as Edward jumped out and snapped offering a piece of advice for Edward to take in the future. Beings flew through the air and Riku was very glad that he wasn't exactly in the crowd, and watched Sora cling to his seat in excitement. It was then Edward manage to perform a nice technique of replacing himself and cutting the glove that Roy had that helped him perform his alchemy. Edward transmutated a huge canon from the ground and was ready to fire when Roy took a hand out of his pocket.

This hand also had a gloved symbol of fire alchemy on it.

Edward was so screwed. There was a shriek as Roy Mustang did a higher power of fire into the canon and it exploded on impact and Edward flew to the ground. Roy Mustang came to the boy and there was a few gestures exchanged between them and Riku was sure he had seen a horrified look on the man of war and it ended off as a stand-off between the two because Edward had managed to get his metal sphere of an arm close to Roy Mustang's neck. It was then announced that Roy and Edward would clean the mess they made, by themselves. Riku, Sora, Alphonse and Riza stood out there as Edward transmutated things and Roy lazily worked with a shovel. Riku had no idea what they were talking about, but he was sure it was something good because the alchemist had yet to yell at Roy.

"When are the next state alchemist tests?" Riku asked the blonde hair woman to his side and the woman blinked her brown eyes.

"A few weeks from now, why?"

"I want to enter."

_End Chapter_

Alright, before we get into a confused questioning rant. I will answer one thing I think stands above all of the questions and that is: Why the hell is Roxas alive and here? Weeeeelll besides fanservice, I believe Roxas was there since the beginning of Kingdom Hearts. Because Sora lost his heart long ago, I believe, it was just replaced with Kairi's as soon as they traveled to the new worlds, and as soon as Sora gave up that heart, he had turned into a heartless himself. Now in my mind, it shouldn't have been that easy for Sora to have turned into a heartless and I personally think Sora's heart was just flouting around (or is actually a part of Kingdom Hearts itself because of the fact that Sora had managed to make the conscious choice of being able to turn back as soon as Kairi tried to give her heart back in a way of protecting Sora)(That and Sora WAS the chosen keyblade wielder, I think the keyblade did that on purpose to have a backup plan, just in case anything happened). Of course, that's the only question I can think up right now. Anyway, so...was this chapter worth the long wait? I hope it was, because I had been angsting over the chapter for awhile and I have no idea what else to do. I hope the characterization is okay and I hope everyone enjoys the fact that Riku is going to try to become a State Alchemist and Edward now has his own keyblade. Ja ne, review if possible. Though by the time this chapter is out, I guess everyone would have forgotten all about this fanfic. Hahaha. Also, why Demyx? Because I love him and he's my own little fanservice to myself (that and he plays a minor important role that any character could have done, but I want him too) and why Larxene? Because she's awesome and the only female of Organization XIII. Also Axel...Ah well...this fanfic needs AxelRoxas (because that was the most implied coupling in KHII that I had ever SEEN throughout the entire game. Yay for Axel!)(That and Axel also plays an important role in the future). You guys have no idea how much KHII pieced EVERYTHING together so much more easier for me. I mean it, you have NO idea. You will in the future...but I guess we'll have to wait, neh? Mwhehehe.

Chapter  
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Update: 11-24-05 to 01-30-07   
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(1): Refer to your nearest FullMetal Alchemist game, the second one on the PS2. Golems were basically like heartless; it scared me when I played it XD.


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